Each step along our individual paths changes us. Some experiences grow body, mind, and soul. Other experiences cause those same parts of us to shrink and ache endlessly. The trick is to let each step teach you even if it pains you. When you dedicate yourself to a task with little hope of recognition or monetary gain, many steps on the path are painful. No matter how much you give or how many you touch, there are still more in need. We live in a harsh world. My hat/cancer bandana off to anyone on the path to healing themselves and/or helping a loved one get relief in the most natural way possible. It takes a lot of courage and resolve to reach the end of the modern medicine road and only be left with options you may be logically against (such as chemo). It’s just as difficult to dutifully stand by and genuinely unconditionally love someone whose body is in decline.

As difficult as those decisions are, being public about them makes those choices even harder, but the stories we tell and leave behind in this time when cannabis legality is in its infancy of revival are a testament to the plant, it healing and transformative powers, and the lives of those left searching for comfort when modern medicine can’t offer it. Each of us who has chosen to tell our tale in the public forum of our day (the internet, or public eye in general) is living history. My endless gratitude to all those out there playing nurse to a loved one so limited in physical ability. Watching the cannabis world work to change from prohibition to test markets for medical use to states defying the federal government to decriminalize for adult use has been a heart twisting journey every step of the road. Please don’t forget the chronically ill folks and their caregivers for each recreational bowl you enjoy or sell legally. We still have a long way to go to honor the people who put their entire lives and health on the line in order to create change. Let’s begin by more and more programs to help the low income patients among us.

After many years of dedication to the cause of cannabis education and healing, This is the greatest need I see in the movement today: Just too many folks with too little resources and too much pain while the price of cannabis remains a burden to their largely ssi/ssd funded existences while pounds of useable cannabis are grown in the name of someone suffering and sold elsewhere by their “caregiver” for a profit. We must do better by the low income legal cannabis patient if we ever hope to legalize cannabis for medicinal or recreational use across the board. But as an individual, I can only offer individual mercy. Lately I’ve been giving free oil to individuals legal in Colorado and to cannabis charities such as Greenfaith Ministries. We need to see more of this kind of mercy.

Feel free to wander around Kiefair.com, wish the site a happy anniversary, comment on and share your favorite articles from years past. Also feel free to comment on this post for any improvements or changes you would like to see to the site. Moving forward, I have a project to preserve samples of products I make and products available in the market for future research. I imagine a time when we are looking back at this period in our shared history as the dawn of cannabis legalization. I imagine scientists wanting to know exactly what we were using. To preserve this history, the best, the good, the bad, and the ugly, I have procured slides and lab vials to make samples to carry on after us.

My next article covers making your own massage oils. As a preview for those eagerly awaiting the write up on that article, Let us have a look at the history of extracting healing compounds or scent compounds from various plants. This history is essential to understanding the next article from kiefair.com

I invite you to come and visit the site through a sampling of the most read articles. Scroll below the photo for the top read articles according to my site’s stats, 2014 reading statistics. Let’s take a look at what people are reading.

This post is not to debate with others about if J.R.R. Tolkien was a stoner or not. This post is for people who have already determined for themselves that he did like to suck on a weed pipe every now and again and who wonder about what is really in Lembas Bread.

Fat Freddy has had a sore on his back for about 3 years and it would not heal! We started putting Rick Simpson Oil on it on November 23, 2011 then the next day we checked it and then checked it every 3 days afterwards, changing the oil and bandage every 3 days as well! I documented the process as long as I was the live in maid/nurse for the patient. (WARNING THIS IS GRAPHIC!)

I do not look like I have a single drop of Mediterranean blood in me, so why do i care about this rare genetic disorder? Because the color of skin is only skin deep. Because despite the pale appearance of my exterior, I have the genetic ancestor from that part of the world who handed me this recessive trait. Because I have this disease and have to live with it…

A set of videos in Tribute to the writing of Hannah Hurnard, “Hind’s Feet on High Places” to Art of Breezy Kiefair i just put music and art to a book that has been a favorite since childhood… my mother used to read me that book…. call it a tribute to her and an introduction of the book to an audience that may otherwise remain unaware of it. I recommend it for anyone with anxiety or PTSD

Ronnie Lee Smith, aka Roland A Duby made much of Kiefair.com possible. In April 2014, he lost his battle with Leukemia after being falsely imprisoned by Yavapai county in Arizona. We got Ronnie out of jail, but only in time for him to die with a pipe in his hands. While Ronnie was alive, he tasked me to keep his oil making method alive. I have done my best to ensure I keep this task entrusted to me by making his method freely available to anyone willing to learn.

*****Note, I have not updated the review page in quite some time. Some of the dispensaries I have reviewed may no longer be in business. The quality at the locations I have reviewed may have changed due to a change in ownership, grower or extraction agreements. Nearly all of my reviews are of MEDICAL locations, so please check to see if they have a retail location before using any of these reviews for a vacation guide.

Here’s to another Great Year!

Grateful Dead Throwing Stones

Do you use Kiefair.com? Do you support me giving out info on cannabis oil creation for free? Do you support my free oil program with the colorado cannabis charity known as Greenfaith Ministry? Well, you may be unaware that one little lady pays for all costs associated with KiefAir.com. The way the site stays afloat with its mini library of cannabis related reference information is through sales of art and books. Each year, I must make $300 in PROFITS from the art at my etsy store and my poetry book sales on amazon.com.

Have a look at some samples from my portfolio, all of these images may be purchased to support kiefair.com

Please remember I only make pennies per art print I sell, so I need to sell a lot of pieces each year. I was very worried about keeping the site open for 2015. The holiday season left me with not one sale. But People pulled together, and We are all set to keep the site open through February 2016!

This is the tale of how I kept the site open this time… previous years, the money had come from my medication budget. This year was different… this happened because a long time patron gifted me $100 to bring the hosting fee bar a little lower, but he was a special case, my first patron ever who seems to still want to pay more for some ceramic figures I did when I was about 14. He always sends me some cash during the winter holidays and on my birthday. In truth this anonymous donor has been more of a father to me than my own. One of the few positive male role models i have had in mu life. The rule is to spend it on something for myself. I misbehaved this year and give the gift to you. This year I’m put it towards continuing to give the gift of information via kiefair.com . Pebbles Trippet, a prominent writer for Skunk Magazine bought a clutch of 4×6 limited edition Maya Angelou memorial prints. Other patrons got posters or 8×10 prints and we made our goal to keep the site open! My thanks to all Patrons!

Portrait of Toni Fox by: Breezy Kiefiar Toni Commissioned me to turn one of her favorite digital images of herself into a canvas painting. Toni said she was so pleased with it that she has it displayed in her home office.

details: 1. Make your selection at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/kiefyart
2. Complete your transaction here and let the artist know what image you desire. Ms. Breezy will ship you a print in the size you desire right away!

FORMATS

Book Description

Publication Date:December 6, 2013

A poetry book centered on pot written by cannabis activist and artist under the influence, Breezy Kiefair. “Of Pain, poetry, and pot.” Is a collection of cannabis centered poetry in a neobeatnik style. It includes updated versions of Allen Allen Ginsberg – Howls “howl” and “america”, along with an update on “to whom it may concern” by Adrian Mitchell , a cannabis parody of Rifleman’s Creed and many other poems that are all my own.

Would You Like To Pick Breezy’s Brain? This wonderful book is a chance to witness the creative process at work; author Breezy Kiefair (aka Breedheen O’Rilley) is the real deal, a gifted poet/journalist/activist on the forefront of the battle for medical marijuana patients’ rights and for truth in media. And speaking of truth, emotional truth is exactly what you’ll get here. Breezy isn’t afraid to take an open-eyed, unsparing look at society, at herself, at her illnesses, at the lies we tell ourselves and each other — and at the scintillating, breathtaking beauty which is more real and more powerful than all else. Highly recommended.

Written by someone very intimate with pain on many different levels. Beautiful and honest. I can’t wait to find out more about this amazing young woman. I originally borrowed this book. I have now read it twice and I have to own it. It must become a part of my permanent collection, along with anything else I can find which flows from this beautiful author.

The poems and rhythm that comes from the author’s feelings show you that she uses her medical cannabis passion and even frustrations to put her concerns into words we can understand. You can feel her pain – you can feel her pride. The transposed songs were a great touch.

This multi-talented artist and writer amazed me with her insightful and sometimes heartbreaking poetry. Her artwork is not only beautiful, but different from any I have seen. I have actually ordered several individual prints off her website to give as gifts this Christmas. I highly recommend this book.

As an activist,a woman and a HUMAN BEING,, I could feel the pain in Ms. O’Rilley’s poetry. Yet I could also feel the triumph. A must for all “pot’ lovers, I got it for 2.99 for my Kindle and it was MORE than worth it. I’ve read these poems over and over, you will too.

This is an excellent book written by a very gifted, unique woman Breezy Keifair. I loved the whole book and have read it a couple of times so far. She is an artist that does her work under the influence of pot for the pain she is in and you can feel that pain with her words. I could really relate to that and a lot of other things in the book. I highly recommend this book. She is also a very gifted artist besides being a good poet and writer.

Talking to Your Doctor, Support from Social Media, and Living Green in a Red State Part Deux

When it was time to talk to the doctor about my decision to try the Cannabis Oil as a treatment for the “C” diagnosis was not sure how it would be accepted. Was so thankful that when we talked she told me many of her patients with HIV/AIDS here in Texas are already using Cannabis Oil! As an Internist with a very large patient base from around the country I was so glad she was positive! Was laughing as I was leaving had to just turn and say “I wonder how much THC I have in me?” She smiled and said “I have those numbers.” There have been many Urine tests. Having a doctor who understands cannabis does no harm is a wonderful thing. It is sad to read people who are trying to talk to the doctors about Cannabis Oil when the doctor’s are not encouraging Cannabis as a treatment option. It’s not really the Doctor’s fault it is the “Lie” of Prohibition.

Medical students follow strict studies to become a Licensed Physician. Specialist’s are required even more stringent rules and studies. The problem is most of the “Drug Education” is provided by large pharmaceutical companies. This limits what the medical students are learning. This results in keeping American Doctor’s dumbed down. These are the Country’s brightest and best who are accepted into Medical School.

Another area where American doctors are falling behind is in Nutrition. From my understanding most Medical Schools only focus on limited numbers of Nutrition Courses required. So these learned persons do not learn about Nature or the benefit of food. In the Bible Belt we have few.

Back to that strong Southern Baptist upbringing we learned “you are what you eat”. My mother also said “An apple a day keeps the doctor away”. My mama was right but she did not know about Genetically Modified Food (GMO) Products are being fed to American’s. Those who are poor it is hard to get food that is not GMO. Improper nutrition results in higher rates of Cancer and other serious illnesses on the residents of the South.

Southern States are used to doing what they have always done. The elected officials have used the lies, bigotry and fear mongering in the Media to sway the feelings of the people. It happened here when Reagan was running for President. The only thing is we have not changed since Reagan in the Southern Bible Belt. These traditions are deeply seeded in our ‘roots’. Doing the same old things in the name of God. The South keeps Union’s out of the South. This keeps most of those living in the South ‘poor’. By spending less on Education and giving huge tax breaks to lure new business to the area they dumb down all children in the Public Education System.

What is really sad… is the fact they do all this hating of others in the name of God. They talk about ‘Abortion is Murder’ yet when the children are born into poverty in Texas in 2011 was reaching 26% or 1 in 4 children in Texas are living at or below the poverty level. When the state refuses increase funding in Education the children suffer. Those children who are being taught in Private Schools have a better opportunity to advance to Higher Learning. Those children in Private School are not in Public Education. The red voters think they are highly educated people who love God. That is why it is so hard for them to see the damage their actions are causing. The ‘white people’ do not even understand the premise of ‘white privilege’. There is no love in the hearts of those who hate others because the sins are different. Being a Southern Baptist we do not have different degrees of sin. A sin is a sin. One as bad as another. We are no longer a giving loving people taking care of other human beings but are mean and angry if we must help those in need.

While educating myself I learned things which made me upset! Finding out how Hemp and Cannabis was removed from American’s in 1937!! Texas Lawmakers failed to provide safe access to the plant for 5 – 10 sessions or between 10 and 20 years. As Texas only meets on odd years. Change is imperative for Texas as a pro-life issue.

People have been trying to get the ‘Word’ out but there seems to be a problem dispensing the information. People who ‘read’ ‘educate’ ‘question’ and do not just take what they throw us as crumbs, begin to gather information from various reliable sources. There is evidence of Legislative items on file, the Pharmacopoeia, and other government agency documents which could be requested under the Freedom of Information Act. Books were read and written documenting these facts. Would our government really do this? Yes they will and yes they did!!! A whole bunch of Laws made totally on lies and continue today across America and the World based solely on Greed of certain men.

Activists who saw Personal Freedoms being illegal for no reason other than money began to write books … about this horrific coop made by the USA on its’ own citizens. There is history of this in books and on the internet on the federal government web sites. I try to use .0rg or .gov as reference sites in my education. There are many activists. There are also many crooks. In the sixty’s we used to say ‘know your dealer’ same is true today.

Well, continuing in 2013 with doctor visits and having things frozen off … the last one was the worst and closest to my brain and spinal cord. It was scary. So would share going to the doctor and why on Facebook. Coming home and waiting for the cancer to do what ever it was going to do … as I was not in the right Zip Code to do anything else. Texas Lawmakers failed to provide a Compassionate Cannabis Care Act for Texas in 2013. There was a Committee Meeting in 2013 but those on the Committee were rude and made fun of those who were there to provide Testimony.

So here we are. Fixing to go into Texas next Legislative Session 2015. We did not Turn Texas Blue. We did not change the make up of the Lawmakers of Texas other than to add some more red ones. Texas only meets every other year so Texas must Legislate in 2015 for us to have any relief. Texas has had some kind of bill every session for over a decade. 2013 we got in Committee. Some of the Committee members came to the witnesses and advocates who were at the Session and said they had no idea.

Team Alexis is the group which represents the families recently announced a meeting is set with the new Speaker of the House for Texas Joe Straus along with DFW Norml. We all can see that a Compassionate Cannabis Care Act is being seriously considered for Texas 2015. Bi-Centennial should be able to also introduce a full Legalization Bill for Texan’s as well! No need for people to be flying to Denver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco or Anchorage to partake of a plant substance. The Cannabis oil was used by the ancient cultures of the world with out a worry about a ‘high’. Do not fear the plant. The law is a lie.

Texas passed no Compassionate Cannabis Care Act for Texans in 2013. Yet I still longed for the Cannabis Oil to treat my Cancer my self. I began to search the Internet for stories and people. ‘Low and Behold’ I found someone with the same diagnosis as me!! I was thrilled!!!

Suddenly, I was in a Movement that I know nothing about except Cannabis is Medicine. Cannabis oil kills cancer cells. Cannabis oil is ILLEGAL. Texas is certainly not the best place to be physically when you have Cancer and choose Cannabis Oil as an Alternative Treatment. There is no Safe Access.

You may recall from my previous entry that I became ill with pneumonia in 2010. As I remember this is what happened….

Upper respiratory infections had always been part of my existence. Nebulizers, Pro Air, Advair, Spiriva, Albuterol, Nasacort, the list goes on and on and on. Breathing medication regularly prescribed by the ‘White Coat Pushers’ and there are many. The boy and I had moved to our new home near the school. Was just the two of us here hubby was in Austin and came home on the week ends.

Was laying on the couch .. not sure of how many days I had been on the couch but it had been many. A friend dropped by to see me but stayed just a few minutes. Quick enough to say ‘You don’t look good’ then leave!! This alerted me that I might be sick.

Picking up my cell phone I sent the text message … “I think I might be sick”. That was all I got in the message. I continued to remain on the couch. Some time after dark he came in the back door. Bless his heart I must have looked bad. Quickly he said he would take me to hospital … explained I was not clean as I had not been able to shower and I could not go to a hospital so dirty. So he allowed me to sleep here on the couch.

In the morning he went out side and got a plastic chair and put it in the shower. He had to help me to the bathroom. He brought me something to tie up my hair. Sitting in the white plastic chair he cleaned me up, dried and dressed me. We got in the car and off to the hospital we went. I forgot to call my doctor and tell him we were on our way to the Emergency Room.

Getting to the hospital I do not really remember. The Emergency Room personnel were top notch. There was not question I was quite ill. Off to Radiology and on fluids immediately. They were so nice. In 2 hospital gowns and was placed in a room. Hubby was there with me. Not sure of what they did but remember more than two bags were hanging numerous times.

Poor hubby … as I would come to this world would think of something that was not at the hospital. He was so sweet. He would go to Wal-Mart or Beall’s the only two choices then in the small town where the hospital is located and lovingly search for the item I thought I needed.

The boy was only 14 then and was worried something might happen to me. He has always been afraid he would loose me. Hubby came home at night to fix him supper and return to the hospital after he went to school. That way he was not alone. The hospital stay was 7 days before release.

Hubby returned to Austin, the boy and I remained here at home. He was 14 and the freezer was full of things he could cook for his self. Had a good friend then named Bea and she helped care for me during this time. Was well enough to move back to my bedroom and no longer on the living room couch. Was thankful to have a caregiver during that difficult time in my life.

Being in your bed with 0 energy and still on antibiotics … my friend Bea introduced me to ‘Farmville’ by Zynga on Facebook. Began playing the game on the computer while my body could do nothing else. Hubby would call and ask ‘What are you doing?’ my answer ‘Petting chickens’. As I write this now … it sound pretty silly to be petting chickens with a mouse on a computer screen … but I did play the game.

The recovery is long for Pneumonia. As I healed I continued to play the games on Facebook to occupy my days and nights as my hubby was in Austin and I was here … at home.

The games continued and friends on the social network were made. Anyone who uses a Social Network knows you get friends by getting to know one person … then you see other friends post and you like what they say or you agree you send a friend request.

During these years when a skin lesion would appear would call the doctor, go in to the office, have it frozen and return home. I did not keep the records of lesions but they did begin to come more often during 2012 -2013. Would sling out ‘Going to doctor to have another one removed’ on the social media site each visit to the doctor.

Texas Bill stalled in Committee in 2013 with the gop Lawmakers laughing and making Cheech & Chong jokes while people were testifying. It was not a happy time. I could not understand how I knew about Cannabis as a medicine for 18 years in California as well as other states. How could Texas Lawmakers not let Texan’s have this Cannabis Medicine? How could Texas Lawmakers not understand that Cannabis has always been medicine? The Lord they taught me about in Sunday School, also Anointed people with Oil. How many times has a Religious leader used Holy Anointing Oil? How could this be happening? These Lawmakers were all ‘self proclaimed Believers’ but they could not believe in a plant given by God/Creator for the people of this planet? How could this be? It was making me doubt my own belief in God. How could these people proclaim God in one breath yet be so full of hate? The hate continues today even worse than before.

All during 2013 I was posting how stupid the Texas Lawmakers were for Failing to provide Compassionate Cannabis Care Act for Texans. Also, Texas had Battleground Texas a Political Effort by the Democratic Party to Turn Texas Blue in the November 2014 Elections. Facebook became a device for me to say things I would have never had the opportunity to say to anyone! There was an audience.

Many Fear changes which are coming but those of us who understand are not afraid of Cannabis. We anxiously await the Gift to us from God to not be an act that may result in a long long Prison Sentence. God intended for this plant to be used by all His creatures.

Unknown to me … as I am new to the Movement. There are people who are willing to risk Personal Freedom to help people who have been diagnosed with Cancer or other terminal disease, to receive free of cost Cannabis Oil. This is done as people who can grow may not have use for the trim called ‘Sugar Leaf’. This is the smaller leaves which are on the buds when the Cannabis Plant goes into Flower stage. Many throw this part of the plant away. It has many medicinal properties.

I am sitting at my laptop one day when someone sent me a message on Facebook. Someone sent a Private Message to me on Facebook and said they had medicine for me! I’m like ‘What I’m in Texas’!! They said ‘You have cancer don’t you?’ Well yes I did … so now what happens? A message comes across saying ‘It’s your Turn! All you need to do is join a Facebook group called Cannabis Oil Success Stories and tell your story there’. That seemed pretty easy!

Having just had my worst experience ever with the last lesion I had frozen. I did not know what to do. I did give my full name, address and zip code to this person on Facebook. I tell the Shiner ‘God Bless YOU!!’ The reply ‘I’m an Atheist but what ever makes you feel good.’ Just like that! An Athiest was sending me free cannabis oil in Texas!!! Tears of joy ran down my face!!! How could I be so blessed?? Thanking God every day!!! Thank you God Thank you God Forgive them God they know not what they do!!! I was being given a gift of Cannabis Oil!!! An Atheist was giving me a gift from the ‘Tree of Life’. The Texas Lawmakers have no idea what God is doing in this Movement. Yes the Movement is full of people from all walks of life … doing what ever they can to bring this healing gift to all who are in need. My belief is God is in control He sees us suffering. God did not intend for us to be here and be unhappy or unkind. ‘Be still and know I am God’. That is one of the hardest for me always amazed when I see His works becoming evident.

It was the end of January 2014. Waiting … for the package to arrive. Waiting for the package to arrive. The package took 8 working days to get to me! Anxious to see what happens I tear into the package with anticipation. Dosing for Cancer I had already learned was 60 grams in 90 days for most cancers. So I knew how to dose and begin immediately!

Now came the time to tell my family about the ‘secret’ kept inside so many years. The thing I had hidden from them so well. I had to tell them why I must have the Cannabis Oil which is a Felony carrying a sentence of up to 99 years in my state. I never hid the fact I was a burner … smoking when ever I can.

Hubby is the one who is most concerned. We both understand if they want me there is nothing he can do to protect me from the law. Life as I know it could change. Having been disabled and dependent since 1995 almost 20 years this is very frightening. It’s not like burning a joint. Texas has loosened up the flowers … under 4 oz can be a misdemeanor. Cannabis oil is not the same in Texas Law. Asset Seizure is another concern for us. The option to let the cancer continue doing what it is doing and die. Or choose to disobey a bad law. A law I know is based on lies since 1937.

Iwas on the West Coast during an R&R in Nam. I loved Huntington Beach, California during Nam … I’m sure I would love it today!! It is a place on our planet you can stand on the ground and see mountains, Pacific Ocean and lovely landscape!! California was always the place for the Movers and Shakers. It was the first time I saw a Mall with more than 1 level!!! Wow, bought an Orange Velvet Mini Dress!! Was ready to have a blast!! Too bad I did not know about Cannabis it was alcohol for me then.

Never having acquired a taste for alcohol … spent most of my evening walking on the beach at night talking with them. They were all drinkers. Beach House in Cali all night! There were many of us there! I had ran into a girl friend from Junior High School. She was living there and took me into the California night life. Staying with my Uncle Oscar Hook (Was at Pearl Harbor, my dad’s brother) and his wife Aunt Hera was a blast. There were a bit upset the 17 year old Texas girl who stayed out all night. We all know girls just wanna have fun til the sun comes up over Santa Monica Blvd. California was wonderful and I enjoyed that trip in the late 60’s very very much. A life memory BC (Before Children).

Do you use Kiefair.com? Do you support me giving out info on cannabis oil creation for free? Well, if KiefAir.com is to stay afloat with its mini library of cannabis related reference information then I need to make $200 in PROFITS from my art sales by March 1 on my etsy store and book sales.

Have a look at some samples from my portfolio, all of these images may be purchased to support keeping kiefair.com open.

Please remember I only make pennies per art print I sell, so I need to sell a lot of pieces. A patron has already gifted me $100 to bring the hosting fee bar a little lower, but he was a special case, my first patron ever who seems to still want to pay more for some ceramic figures I did when I was about 14. He always sends me some cash during the winter holidays and on my birthday. In truth this anonymous donor has been more of a father to me than my own. One of the few positive male role models i have had in mu life. The rule is to spend it onsomething for myself. I’m going to misbehave this year and give the gift to you. This year I’m putting it towards continuing to give the gift of information via kiefair.com

details: 1. Make your selection at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/kiefyart
2. Complete your transaction here and let the artist know what image you desire. Ms. Breezy will ship you a print in the size you desire right away!

Formats

Book Description

Publication Date:December 6, 2013

A poetry book centered on pot written by cannabis activist and artist under the influence, Breezy Kiefair. “Of Pain, poetry, and pot.” Is a collection of cannabis centered poetry in a neobeatnik style. It includes updated versions of Allen Allen Ginsberg – Howls “howl” and “america”, along with an update on “to whom it may concern” by Adrian Mitchell , a cannabis parody of Rifleman’s Creed and many other poems that are all my own.

Would You Like To Pick Breezy’s Brain? This wonderful book is a chance to witness the creative process at work; author Breezy Kiefair (aka Breedheen O’Rilley) is the real deal, a gifted poet/journalist/activist on the forefront of the battle for medical marijuana patients’ rights and for truth in media. And speaking of truth, emotional truth is exactly what you’ll get here. Breezy isn’t afraid to take an open-eyed, unsparing look at society, at herself, at her illnesses, at the lies we tell ourselves and each other — and at the scintillating, breathtaking beauty which is more real and more powerful than all else. Highly recommended.

Written by someone very intimate with pain on many different levels. Beautiful and honest. I can’t wait to find out more about this amazing young woman. I originally borrowed this book. I have now read it twice and I have to own it. It must become a part of my permanent collection, along with anything else I can find which flows from this beautiful author.

The poems and rhythm that comes from the author’s feelings show you that she uses her medical cannabis passion and even frustrations to put her concerns into words we can understand. You can feel her pain – you can feel her pride. The transposed songs were a great touch.

This multi-talented artist and writer amazed me with her insightful and sometimes heartbreaking poetry. Her artwork is not only beautiful, but different from any I have seen. I have actually ordered several individual prints off her website to give as gifts this Christmas. I highly recommend this book.

As an activist,a woman and a HUMAN BEING,, I could feel the pain in Ms. O’Rilley’s poetry. Yet I could also feel the triumph. A must for all “pot’ lovers, I got it for 2.99 for my Kindle and it was MORE than worth it. I’ve read these poems over and over, you will too.

This is an excellent book written by a very gifted, unique woman Breezy Keifair. I loved the whole book and have read it a couple of times so far. She is an artist that does her work under the influence of pot for the pain she is in and you can feel that pain with her words. I could really relate to that and a lot of other things in the book. I highly recommend this book. She is also a very gifted artist besides being a good poet and writer.

“Green” living in a Red State after 2014 Elections

By: Verde Loneowl

As a 5th Generation Dallasite the youngest of 3 girls. Life was good all was well with the Earth. Daddy, said when General Eisenhower was elected .. don’t ever elect one of those Republicans, “you can’t make any money when they are in charge” was what he said … It has always stuck. The Fear of the GOP was instilled into my brain at a young age.

Sick and disabled since 1995 with some sort of AutoImmune disorder after our Vacation to Lake Tahoe .. the cancer followed after a long IM injection therapy for Lyme Disease with Rochephin. The IM injections were about a year in duration. If you have no experience with Lyme disease, I encourage you to watch the documentary film

“Under Our Skin”

About 8-10 years ago I went to the dermatologist in Bryan, Texas, Terry Jones, MD, to have a biopsy on a bump on the nape of my neck. A few days later I went in to have a mole removed from my back. The new doctor in the practice called to give me the lab results. “The mole on your back was benign. Oh but the other one is Squamous Cell Carcinoma.” Thanks so much. Never returned to Dr. Terry Jones’ office.

One of my friend’s Judy Greer, RN, her dad was being treated for Squamous Cell Carcinoma at the same time. Chemo was extremely difficult. My choice … let it kill me and tell NO ONE. So to spare my family the pain of knowing cancer was diagnosed decided to live what was left on God’s time. God’s time was very important to me as my daddy was a Deacon and my mom was an Officer in the Women Missionary Union of The Southern Baptist Church, Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas. We were a strong church family. This was the only decision in my mind. As I knew the chemo killed you and radiation causes cancer. So I decided to quit cutting my hair.

So we all went on about our life as if nothing was wrong with anyone in my family. When a sore would come up a trip to the Family DO and get it frozen, no more biopsy’s … as the little bumps are quite painful. squamous Cell Carcinoma is inside the blood stream.

In 2013 hearing that Medicinal Cannabis would be given in the State House of Representatives (to find your local representative’s contact information for Texas, please click here). I anxiously awaited the Texas Senate Committee hearing live feed for Medical Cannabis for Texas! The Cannabis Oil would cure cancer! The Federal Government had a Patent! Many who are sent home to die are not dying!! Oh my goodness! Soon I could begin treating with Cannabis Oil!! The doctor’s in California had been on the Morning Shows saying juice the leaves for the health benefits since 1995 … what was happening … the elected officials were so rude to those there to testify! How could this be? Not voted out of Committee?? They did not know Cannabis Oil cured cancer? Oh no now what?

Screaming out loud at the television … my husband awoke to ask “What was wrong?” I explained no way would we get Medical in 2013. My heart had sunk. The death sentence was looming closer. Still my family did not know cancer was inside me. My hubby was about to find out but did not know how to tell him.

Medical Cannabis denied by Texas Law Makers. Texas has no way to put anything onto the ballot by Petition. All laws must be done during Session and they only meet every other year! Oh my goodness … what now? Educate.

As Facebook connections were already available using those connections of people who were already in the states who had medical Cannabis and by January 2014 we had states Legalizing Cannabis for Recreational use! Texas was 20 years behind! Oh my goodness!! Networks started happening .. Noticing people were sending me Friend Requests connecting with people who were using this plant across the Planet! Not just in America but around the world people were making Cannabis Oil. Some of the stories were not happy endings, many have died while waiting to be Legally Healed. Some are being Illegally Healed. More about that another day. Once my story of Cancer came out on Facebook … along with my story about Cannabis was medicine for over 100 diseases until 1937… “they” found me. Not sure how “they” found me but “they” did. So many have taught me so much! First thing I didn’t know Sugar feeds Cancer. When they do the PET scan to see the Cancer… they shoot sugar-water into you and it lights up the cancer. Thinking Sugar was be the most difficult for me to give up. It was not. 1 week off sugar. Now I use Raw Honey in my coffee. Buying Organic food only when I can find it. We are not too healthy in my area. We do all we can to do it correctly.

If you would like to read up on the how and why cannabis can heal so many things, please click here

I can’t remember how many lesions or how often. I remember the last one … was very painful .. up above the hair-line on the base of my neck, it took a long time for him to get that one. It was frightening. It was close to the base of my skull closest one to my brain and my spinal column. I knew my time was getting closer to leave my family.

2013-2014 was spent learning the good and the bad things about this Highly Unregulated Industry. Many countries are growing hemp. The Stalks and roots are left and these are sent to China as Industrial Hemp Waste. The Chinese processed the hemp stalks and the roots into industrial hemp waste paste and pack it into drums and sell it this product. Desperate parents unable to get medicine for babies and the medicine they were using was Industrial Hemp Waste Products from China should be no THC high CBD no high for the babies oh NO!! It takes time to expose people who are doing things wrong. Right away seeing this people desperate for medicine were being railroaded into trying snake oil. Babies were sick and hospitalized. At that time my own illness had to be placed on the back burner and someone had to save the Children! It had to be me! Oh my goodness!

I Found myself on a forum Children using Cannabis, CBD, sites on Facebook or Scam sites to protect as many as could be protected. Names are found quickly and you may no longer be able to see what is happening in the bad part. The Stanley Brothers in Colorado Springs area are using the Federal Government and the Hemp Farm Act to try to provide CBD Hemp Oil to children with seizures.

More information on the scams of the “Realm of Caring”

Problem not enough THC the oil quits working for the children and they begin to have break through seizures. The parents in Legal Cannabis States can supplement the THC that is needed. Those who allowed CBD Only or Limited bills are not BEING SERVED! It is broken and not working! Even the high CBD comes from the leaves and flowers of the Cannabis Plant not a hemp plant. Each strain has different ratios of CBD/THC/CBG/THCa there are hundreds of compounds. Cannabis makes flowers and leaves … Hemp provides very little useable compounds as there are no flowers for industrial products hemp oil, hemcrete, cloth, paper, art, and other industries. The new Charlotte’s Web has changed from Cannabis hybrid with R4 hemp to get the CBD up and the THC down. That was then! Now the Stanley Brothers are providing Charlotte’s Web HEMP OIL! Please you must educate and protect as there are no safeguards other than each state’s laws. Right now not one of the bills in the CBD only states are currently working, at this time to my knowledge. Know many of these parent warriors.

First let me assure you the high is … you feel good. It is not like a drunk. If you have not experienced a “high” you should try it before your worry about your child might be high. Many parents should be reading the “Side Effects” of the Pharma… Phenobarbital (INN) or phenobarbitone (BAN) is( a long-acting barbiturate and the most widely used anti-seizure medication globally. It has sedative properties, but as with other barbiturates, benzodiazepines are more commonly used for this purpose. Anyone else think these lab created, doctor prescribed drugs are a bad idea for children? Some of the AED Seizure meds can cause DEATH as a side effect! Cannabis Oil, ZERO deaths. You can not die from too much Cannabis it never passes the part of the brain that controls your heart or lungs… Just how smart is that?? God made this plant perfect in every way! The Plants come from Seed and it is here for our health and well-being. Sun Grown is the best method as it provides Oxygen in to the air for us to breathe! But if you can not grow legally you can use a closet and grow your plants for your medicine! It is so important for everyone who can grow to please grow and share this gift with others, in a safe manner.

A new study suggests alcohol is more harmful than heroin or crack MOST people would agree that some drugs are worse than others: heroin is probably considered to be more dangerous than marijuana, for instance. Because governments formulate criminal and social policies based upon classifications of harm, a new study published by the Lancet on November 1st makes interesting reading. Researchers led by Professor David Nutt, a former chief drugs adviser to the British government, asked drug-harm experts to rank 20 drugs (legal and illegal) on 16 measures of harm to the user and to wider society, such as damage to health, drug dependency, economic costs and crime. Alcohol is the most harmful drug in Britain, scoring 72 out of a possible 100, far more damaging than heroin (55) or crack cocaine (54). It is the most harmful to others by a wide margin, and is ranked fourth behind heroin, crack, and methamphetamine (crystal meth) for harm to the individual. The authors point out that the model’s weightings, though based on judgment, were analysed and found to be stable as large changes would be needed to change the overall rankings

This movement started decades ago. In the meantime we will be dreaming of another place where we can have the Right to Pursue Happiness and Freedoms while healing my body of cancer and disease! We have several Groups of Texans who want to see Cannabis Medicine. Connecting together on Facebook to be ready to go into Austin when the Session begins 2015. We have circled the Wagons to get our selves together and we are waiting for others to join us!

As more main stream news agency’s are interviewing these parents and patients who are healing across America. Hoping those who read this story will contact Texas Elected officials … if you use this medicine you can not come to Texas. Children and adults must leave Texas in order to cure the illnesses with Cannabis Oil. My goal is for Not One more Texan have to move away for Cannabis Oil. Hoping we can gather more help from the Grass Root efforts.

Choosing to be a Non-Dues paying member to anyone’s group. I dab (pun) some from all of the Facebook groups. Just not sure which ones to trust and which ones to not trust. Many are “Grass Roots” until you get on the Cash Cow … as Cannabis … Marihauna … Pot … Weed and other products can change your outlook.

For those who understand Extraction Methods … my personal preference for Cancer treatment is Flowers and Leaf with a full Organic Grain Alcohol Extraction. The cancer treatment is hard and fast but nothing like Chemo. People usually sleep, eat and enjoy life. Please if you can Grow do Grow and share this wonderful Cannabis Oil with others often!!

Extractions, grows, and other illegal activities are not being conducted at my home. Waiting on the laws to change. We must be ready!

It’s been a short 12 since the Elections … Much is happening in Texas and America … as we get ready to head into the 2015 Session. Texas only meets every other year so if Texas is doing anthing like a Compassionate Care Act Texans must unite regardless of party lines. Compassion knows no party lines.

Earlier this week Rice Univsersity’s, Baker Institute department of Drug Policy provided a Program called “Is Texas Ready for Medical Marihauna?” It was very informative but was a bit weak … sometimes when you work in an area so long you loose sights… Like at the very beginning the news source quoted “Texas Tribune” is a gop rag ran by the very attorney’s representing Governor Perry in a Felony Indictment in Texas. It is definitely, a red rag flying and spreading the news of the gop around. Not a reliable source but are there really any reliable sources?

It’s almost 2 hours long. Ann Lee, with Republican’s Against Marijuana Prohibition has more going on in the Houston area! We are so thankful for Ann who is works long and hard to End Prohibition.

Florida which received 58% of the vote for Medical Cannabis Initiative but 60% was required for a ballot to pass. Florida also had filed a limited bill! Thankfully, it lost in court so it’s back to the drawing board for Florida! Saving states from more bad law is very difficult with people like the Stanley Brother’s from Colorado. The science is in that CBD only does not work without THC. So more bad laws are in place for 2014 and not one is working. The only Compassionate Acts working are using Whole Cannabis Plant based medicine in 23 states and DC.

Educating those in the Republican Party who hasve taken such a hard hard stance against Cannabis as Medicine will make it hard but not impossible. Texans state wide must make an effort to contact their elected officals if we are to Make it Happen in 2015!! We are working at doing just that in Texas! Texas is a large state and networking together regardless of our affliations must be bipartisan! The Compassionate Cannabis Care Act will be over one of the largests numbers of people to date! We have many in Texas who will benefit from this Legislative Action. This is about Personal Freedom. Freedom! We can no longer allow the Republican Party to use Religion to Stop Cannabis when Cannabis is a Gift from our God/Creator. You can not be Pro-Life and be for Prohibition. It just does not work.

Alexis Bortell, age 9 is one of DFW Normal’s Poster Children for Medical Cannabis. We have 4 in all but they represent over 85 families not counting the ones we have already sent into other States for Compassionate Care. Alexis’s dad is a Disabled Vet and her mother is as well! Whole Plant is all we can accept in Texas after seeing every bill in 2014 fail to work with a CBD only and no THC or limited amounts. Alexis has already been to Colorado and has her Red Card for treatment. She is a Texas Girl and wants to stay in Texas. She does not want to live in Colorado. Quite frankly wonder if some in Colorado are a little tired of us sending our sick and disabled there! Texas is losing money every day we do not have laws on the books in Texas for Full Compassionate Care as well as Legalization for Freedoms. Alexis, spoke at the DFW Marihuana March in October. They estimated over 5000 people in attendance, during the Ebola scare! Thinking that was a good thing. The police departments in both Dallas and Frisco had no problems with our Peaceful March’s to bring about the truth! If you are not on the Cannabis’ side you are on the wrong side of History! End Prohibition Nationwide and Free the POW’s. Leaving no one behind. As you can see from this video the Employee’s of the State of Texas working for Represenative Scott Turner, appear to have little regard for a young 9 year old girl. They shot the finger at her! A 9 year old in front of TV Camera’s from Channel 33 in DFW area. Someone said the Video put up by the station when shared was removed from Facebook. As I live a long way from the DFW area was not there in person. This video pretty much sums it up … we are peacefully asking for our Freedom and being ignored by the Republican Elected Officals. We see this as a Public Health Issue which is not being addressed by our State Legislature and across the Bible Belt. Pleople must Stand Up with us! Contacting your elected officials at both the State and National level!

The saddest thing is Cannabis … never hurt anyone. The Lies about this plant have harmed many! If you can grow … grow and share with those who can not. Onelove

I wore the Heart of Atnimera for many months. Before I continue, everyone should understand that Opals are a very Brittle stone in need of frequent oiling, a crack in an opal is common and I probably bear most of the blame for it cracking by not oiling it properly. I find no fault in the craftsmanship. The opal in the old Heart of Atnimera had broken. On a day when my heart likewise was broken, but that is another tale. Upon hearing my “other tale”. Wren Déjà Vu SmilingDeer sat down at her MaeCody Gems & Jewels bench and crafted me this queenly pendant on a beautiful wire work chain. —

The opal in the old Heart of Atnimera had broken. On a day when my heart likewise was broken. Wren Déjà Vu SmilingDeer sat down at her MaeCody Gems & Jewels bench and crafted me this queenly pendant on a beautiful wire work chain. — with Wren Déjà Vu SmilingDeer in Denver, Colorado.

As soon as the replacement arrived, I couldn’t help myself… I had to wear the new amulet right away… but a few days later…. I thought about the old and broken Heart of Atnimera… still soaking in the massage oil in my sacred space where I left it.

I couldn’t help myself… I had to wear the new amulet right away… but a few days later…. I thought about the old and broken heart of atnimera… still soaking in the massage oil in my sacred space where I left it. Today I went and retreived the heart of atnimera and found a surprise… note the difference in the shades of opals… one is almost like amber dark under the copper. I squeeeled with delight when I found the opal had swollen aw little and the wire work had tightened around the stone meaning I could once again wear the heart of Atnimera with pride

I thought more and more about the old and broken Heart of Atnimera… still soaking in the massage oil in my sacred space where I left it. Today I went and retrieved the heart of Atnimera and found a surprise… note the difference in the shades of opals… one is almost like amber dark under the copper. I squealed with delight when I found the opal had swollen aw little and the wire work had tightened around the stone meaning I could once again wear the heart of Atnimera with pride

The Origin of The Heart of Atnimera

The life of this amulet is already set into it’s creation Breezy. As enchanting an unnamed creation is a bit tricky but worth the time. Your amulet has been carried with me every day, though all the muck and heavy emotions, through all the joys and trials of time spent with the Creator. She was there when I was joyful, she was there when I was in pain. She was there to listen, and soak up my hopes and dreams. She was there to capture the energies of the Triple Goddess to pass them on to a future with the one she was intended for. Intentions… Your name has been placed on each bend, each turn of the coil, and sets of three. Cleansed, smudged and anointed, I give this gift to you. Please give her a name so she might live.
Emerald Gemstone meaning
The emerald is the sacred stone of the goddess Venus. It was thought to preserve love, and has long been the symbol of hope. It is considered by many to be the stone of prophecy. The emerald acts as a tranquilizer for a troubled mind.
The emerald is said to bring the wearer reason and wisdom. The strongest time for the powers of the emerald is said to be spring Lucky for love, give your lover an emerald to stay faithful.
In several cultures the emerald was the symbol for fertilizing rain. In the Christian faith it is the symbol of faith and hope. Healing properties of Emerald
Emerald is used by healers to help heal the heart. The power of the Emerald is highest at the full moon.
Some cultures thought the emerald would heal any disease of the eye. The emerald would be placed in a container of water overnight and the water would be poured on the eyes the next day.
Emerald is a stone of great harmony, wisdom and love. Giving your lover an Emerald will bring the lover closer if the giver’s motives are pure love. The Emerald can be a bridge between 2 people. The Emerald vibrates with love. https://crystal-cure.com/emerald.html
Opal History, Lore and Properties
“Opal…Made up of the glories of the most precious gems, to describe it is a matter of inexpressible difficulty: there is in it the gentler fire of the Ruby, there is the brilliant purple of the Amethyst, there is the sea-green of the Emerald, all shining together in an incredible union. Some aim at rivaling in lustre the brightest azure…of the painter’s palette, others the flame of burning sulphur, or of a fire quickened by oil.” ~ Pliny the Elder
The name Opal is derived from the Sanskrit word “upala”, meaning “valuable stone”. This is believed to be the root word for the Greek term “opallios”, which translates as “color change”.
Opal is thought to have been discovered as long as 4,000 years ago, and myths and lore abound in practically all cultures about this brilliant gemstone. The ancient Greeks thought opal to be the tears of Zeus and prized it as highly as diamonds. They believed opal gave the gift of foresight and prophecy, which would ensure the owner’s success in war, business and life.
The legend of the Australian aborigine tells that opal is ‘creator’s footprint that touched the earth at the base of a rainbow to bring harmony’.
The ancient Romans wore opal as a symbol of hope and purity and believed it could cure illness. In ancient India, opal was referred to as the Goddess of the Rainbow, turned to stone. Ancient Arab cultures believed opal had fallen from the sky and that the play of color was trapped lightning. According to Arab lore, opal could make the wearer invisible. The ancient Australian aborigines, however, believed in a more sinister origin. They thought opal to be half serpent and half devil, and that the brightly colored fire within the stone was an attempt to lure them into the devil’s lair.
Opal has been thought to have healing powers in many world cultures, and in the middle ages, it became known as the Opthalmius, or Eye Stone, and was thought to strengthen eyesight. Blonde maidens wore opals to protect their hair from fading or darkening.
In the Middle Ages, Opal was considered a stone that could provide great luck because it was believed to possess all the virtues of each gemstone whose color was represented in the color spectrum of the opal.
Ethiopian Opal:
This stone is also known as the “Chocolate Opal” because of its chocolate color inside its nodule. Another Opal was discovered with very brilliant colors and mostly red and little blue (unlike those opals mined in Australia) and is called Ethiopian Fire Opal.
There is also Wello Opal which is mined in the high desert of Ethiopia. This is actually a combination of various kinds of opal which are mined in Wello, Ethiopia.
Good Ethiopian opals have diverse play of colors from Neon reds, oranges, green, blue, white, yellow, brown and a fire color. There are even colors that are not present in Australian opals like turquoise and indigos. Ethiopian fire opals are popular as they have striking pattern formations which make each opal so unique.
However, there has also been rumors and superstition about the Opal as being a stone of bad luck. At one point opal had became so popular and wanted that it began to rival the diamond in popularity, so the diamond merchants began spreading the rumor that opals brought bad luck to the wearer. It was quite effective, and even today, there are those who believe it is unlucky to buy or wear one unless it is your birthstone (October)
However, these superstitions of bad luck were not believed by all including the Queen Elizabeth II. She ensured that all her subjects knew that she did not believe in these rumors and superstitions. Throughout her reign, she wore opals herself and gave them to her daughters as gifts. The Queen’s efforts have been credited with helping opal shed its bad luck reputation and regain popularity with the public. http://crystal-cure.com/article-opal-history-properties.html
How to Enchant an Object
To “enchant” an object is to fill it with energy for a specific purpose. While there are all sorts of “ookey-spooky,” and dramatically ritualized methods of doing so, what it all basically boils down to is direct, programmed energy that has been gatherer and shaped by the will of the magician through deliberate visualization. What happens in the mind is a microcosm of what happens in the macrocosm of the physical world. This is what the phrase “As above, so below” means. What happens in the microcosm of our minds can be directly reflected in the macrocosm of the world outside the mind.
So to enchant an object, and there by change it into a talisman, all you need to do is concentrate on directing energy for a specific purpose and direct it into the object. In the case of being “invisible” what you would want to do is visualize yourself walking along in a swirl of concealing mist (this mist represents the energy you are gathering). In you mind, see people starting to look at the mist, only to have their gaze “slide” off, pulled to one side or drawn to something near you rather than focusing *on* you. When you have built a clear image of this in your mind then visualize the ring and see the swirling mist of energy being drawn into and stored within the ring.
When all of the mist has been drawn into the ring you’re done… maybe. At this point you can either “seal” the ring and be done with it, or you can add a “trigger” which will turn the power of the talisman on or off deliberately.
With the former, the power of the talisman will be constantly active and the only way to stop it will be to take it off and place it in a bag or something that has been specifically charged to block the activity of the ring.
With the latter, you install an on/off switch, basically. This can be either as set of spoken words of phrases (make sure it’s something easy to remember, but not so common as to be used in every-day speech: “shields up” and “shields down” works well) or you can use a simple visualization (when you want it to activate, visualize the mist leaving the ring and surrounding you, and when you want it to deactivate visualize the mist being pulled back into the ring.)
Creating the trigger takes a little more work on your part, but is usually well worth it as you can wear the ring at all times without worry. With the other method, you’ll have to deliberately put it on and take it off, which increases the risk of loosing it… and few things are harder to find that an invisibility talisman!
Now as for a protection ritual, I have and example of a personal protection ritual if that’s what you’re actually looking for at http://www.geocities.com/jkarrah/Protection.html
The ring we have been talking about in this example would be perfect to use as the “Personal item” that would be transformed into the talisman.
I would also like to point out that, while the ritual itself appears on the surface to be fairly elaborate, it could be easily adjusted. The cleansing of the ring can be done simply by running it under clear water while visualizing all unwanted energies being washed down the drain, the runes can be drawn on a piece of white paper using ink of your astrological color (if possible write them in a circular pattern the put the ring inside the rune circle), and then just do the chants.
The key to this or any sort of magic is that you have a clear, solid “image” of your intent… what it is you want to have happen. This is what it going to allow your subconscious to gather the energies you need and program them with your desired purpose. If you are uncertain as to *exactly* what it is you intend to accomplish then your results will be uncertain. You don’t have to know the exact mechanics of “how” the task should be accomplished (in fact, it’s usually best if you just set some basic parameters and let the universe take care of the details), but you do need to precisely know and understand the “what” and the “why.”
Also, with an item of jewelry being used as the talisman, it is possible to have the item professionally engraved. For our ring example, if the band is wide enough, you could take it and a straight-line rendition of the protection runes from the above ritual to a jeweler’s and ask if they could engrave those symbols onto the ring for you (do this *before* you perform the ritual).
*A talisman is an object that has been specifically charged to perform a specific function. Talismans are usually, but not always, man made. An amulet, on the other hand, is an object, usually of natural origin (i.e. crystals, stones, plants, *naturally shed* feathers, etc. which have certain “virtues” and magical properties as an inherent part of their existence.http://www.geocities.com/jkarrah/Enchantment.html
The Triple Goddess
The triple moon is a Goddess symbol that represents the Maiden, Mother, and Crone as the waxing, full, and waning moon. It is also associated with feminine energy, mystery and psychic abilities. You often see this symbol on crowns or other head-pieces, particularly worn by High Priestesses.
The Maiden represents enchantment, inception, expansion, the female principle, the promise of new beginnings, youth, excitement, and a carefree erotic aura. The Maiden in Greek Mythology is Persephone – purity – and a representation of new beginnings. Other maiden goddesses include: Brigid, Nimue, among others.
The Mother represents ripeness, fertility, fulfillment, stability, and power. The Mother Goddess in Greek mythology is Demeter, representing wellspring of life, giving and compassionate. Other mother goddesses include: Aa, Ambika, Ceres, Astarte, Lakshmi.
The Crone represents wisdom, repose, and compassion. The Crone in Greek mythology is Hecate – wise, knowing, a culmination of a lifetime of experience. Crone goddesses include: Hel, Maman Brigitte, Oya, Sedna, Skuld, and others.
Using natural and antiqued copper wire

To learn more about Wren Déjà Vu SmilingDeer who created these lovely wire work pendants and has taken such care in charging them, please read

I published this a few years ago. In a few days, he’d be 16, and with the death of a lover this spring I am more depressed than usual. When confronted with death, I often retreat… Especially if my body is failing as well (lack of Phoenix tears not helping) but I am trying not to complain

Fear, that is reverence for God is that font from whence Wisdom derives. Or perhaps the threshold by which She enters one’s being. We know this cannot be “fear” as we imagine it such as anxiety over some worldly matter or a sudden shock to the system when some unexpected event takes place because “perfect love casteth out fear.” [1 Jn 4:18] In fact, we are…

Revere: to hold in great regard or religious respect

Reverence: veneration [L. venerari: worship]

counseled that we may be untroubled by “sudden fear” in Pr 3:25.

If God really is that angry, jealous, flaming Jonathan Edwards dykehead they warned me about at Agape Force, then to hell with him. Somewhere up in that collection of books and letters called “Bible” that Christians approach with such futility is the key to all this for me: “God is Love,” (“somewhere” being 1Jn 4:8, also). A very limited grasp of and tiny application of reason will show one that from this one can extrapolate: Love is God. I know so many more pagans that grasp this concept than Christians that it’s just stupid. Be that as it may, my vow is this: Whatever other gods may be running around loose in the world, the One that is Love is the One for me. If it turns out in the end that God is not Love, well then–fork God.

“[T]o love mercy and to walk humbly with my God[s]”
Note that in deference to weak spirits i have deleted the various “f-bombs” and such that ordinarily gild my work. Many of these lines are apt to be much funnier if you fill them in with your imagination. Or maybe not; this box may have fixed the troubling humor problem in spades.

Now, i don’t believe the darker potentiality here is true. My entire life has been flavored by a discomfort with Christianity, even when i embraced it in one of its most diseased and virulent forms, which trepidation has been based on a subthreshold sense of a paradox the Christians can’t seem to abandon.

I don’t mean to say that it’s impossible for Love to be angry, (which would render this piece a bit useless), but there exist many Christians–many–that are much like that angry bucker mentioned above. My dear friend Dave Reese, (whom i’ve not seen for some while, now…Hi, Dave!), once told me that he’d be happy to see a rigid theocracy in the United States, with pillories and stocks set up on the lawn at the Pioneer Museum, (housed in a severe old fortress-like invaders’ courthouse building in Colorado Springs, for you far-flung readers).

Now, Dave is not a raving lunatic or a constant irritant like many Christians. He’s a gentle, loving family man; an actual pastor, and a thinking man influenced by crap in the Bible that seems to extol this sort of holy prickery as a virtue. Without even finding it necessary to dig around in “scripture” about the nature of God’s anger, i assert that the initial problem at hand is twofold. Christians in(forking)sist that the Bible is the Truth, the whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth. Bull(shorts). Secondly, Reason, as we understand Her, effective and useful though She may be, is not any better at providing a complete vision of What There Is than the Bible, nor is the Universe subject to Her demands, (again, as we grok). It is impossible for the hare to catch the turtle, after all.

OK, before we continue, let us first establish from your own assertions, dear Christian, that for the sake of discussion here, a priori as you always in(forking)sist, the modern Bible really does represent the sacrosanct and perfect Word of God: A Logos in its own right–the God-breathed eternal and incorruptible Word, as it has been explained to me by intelligent members of your own cult: Jesus, Written. We can defer to the “Authorized” version in case you are one of those sticklers, since i prefer its poetry anyhow.

With that foundation established and held firmly in mind, observe the breakdown to follow where it is amply demonstrated that the Old Testament of the Bible teaches very clearly that some tightly held Christian doctrines of the faith are based on drastic misinterpretation.

Pr 1:20 Wisdom crieth without;

she uttereth her voice in the streets:

21 she crieth in the chief place of concourse,

in the openings of the gates….
And what pray tell, does She cry?

Pr 1:7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge….
But,
1Jn 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.1 John 4:18

There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

Pr 1:21 [S]he crieth in the chief place of concourse,

in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,

22 How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity?

and the scorners delight in their scorning,

and fools hate knowledge?
1:23 Turn you at my [Wisdom’s] reproof:

behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you,

I will make known my words unto you.
Joel 2:27

And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed. 28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh….
Confirmed in NT: Acts 2:17 And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh….

therefore thus saith the Lord God of hosts, the God of Israel… “I have spoken unto them, but they have not heard; and Ihavecalled unto them, but they have not answered.”
Pr 2:6 For the Lord giveth wisdom:

out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding.

*Observe at this point that “Wisdom” here is personified as both female and powerful. She possesses attributes and claims prerogatives reserved for God elsewhere in the Bible. The entire collection of Proverbs 1 through 15 is a conversation with Wisdom, Knowledge, and Understanding, with appearances by Discretion, Prudence, and others. These are both mingled and separated at various points in the text. The above verse shows at least Knowledge and Understanding as coming from God’s [The LORD; Tetragrammaton] mouth. That is, these are aspects of the word of God; an expression or embodiment of Logos, or at least some sort of Sister to the Son.

Pr 2:10 When wisdom entereth into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul….
We see around and about that this is the behavior of the Holy Spirit, which is called the spirit of Christ, and of Christ, the Logos, as well. Pay attention, now:
Col 2:2 …that their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ; 3 in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.Romans 5:5

…and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.

2 Corinthians 1:21-23

21 Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; 22 who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. [See also Pr 16:3].Galatians 4:6

And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.Ephesians 3:17

[T]hat Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith that ye, being rooted and grounded in love….Colossians 3:16

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom….Hebrews 4:12

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. [This is interesting–what is discernment, really, but the exercise of wisdom through understanding?].

Forsake her not, and she shall preserve thee: love her, and she shall keep thee.Nehemiah 9:6

Thou, even thou, art Lord alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein, and thou preservest them all; and the host of heaven worshippeth thee.Psalm 16:1

That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.

Proverbs 3:5

5 Trust in the Lord with all thine heart;

and lean not unto thine own understanding.
Note that this does not in any wise suggest that one ought to abandon understanding, which as is on display here in previous proverbs is the Goddess, the Holy Spirit, Whom will enter any soul that reveres God.
To clarify:

Proverbs 16

16 The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the Lord.

2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weigheth the spirits.

3 Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established.

Proverbs 4 is so entirely loaded with the Goddesses Wisdom and Understanding, and the rewards of Her [their] pursuit that it verily stands alone in this deliberation. It seems the principal thing, though, is, well, the principal thing.
Pr 4:7 Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.
The attentive reader of scripture will no doubt wonder just how anything can be the principal thing, named with a feminine pronoun, other than the Goddess, both equal and One with any other aspect of Godhead. This entire chapter, with its promises of exaltation and crowns of grace and glory could well have fallen within the New Testament. If not for the Goddesses.

This is classic:
Pr 4:13 Take fast hold of instruction; let her not go:

keep her; for she is thy life.
Acts 17:28 …for in him [God] we live, and move, and have our being….

5 that they may keep thee….
This may be read in light of Ro 8:15:
For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

Pr 8 is intriguing because of the interaction of pronouns. Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, and Prudence are each named separately, yet referenced collectively by singular, feminine pronouns. 8:5 reads:
“O ye simple, understand wisdom: and, ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart,” a bit of mingling that further shades the relationship between and among these decisively feminine personifications. Webster, in the cheezy, junior-high school dictionary they provide us at the El Paso County Jail, uses these various words to define each the other, with various shades between them. For example, “prudence” is the cautious application of wisdom and discretion with an eye toward future outcomes.
Perhaps even more telling for the purposes of this particular conversation is the bit between vv. 22 and 30:
22 The Lord possessed me [Wisdom] in the beginning of his way,

before his works of old.

23 I was set up from everlasting,

from the beginning, or ever the earth was.

24 When there were no depths, I was brought forth;

when there were no fountains abounding with water.

25 Before the mountains were settled,

before the hills was I brought forth:

26 while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields,

nor the highest part of the dust of the world.

27 When he prepared the heavens, I was there:

when he set a compass upon the face of the depth:

28 when he established the clouds above:

when he strengthened the fountains of the deep:

29 when he gave to the sea his decree,

that the waters should not pass his commandment:

when he appointed the foundations of the earth:

30 then I was by him, as one brought up with him:

and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him….
Any honest Bible reader will no doubt recognize the similarities this passage bears with the first few chapters of John’s gospel when describing Jesus as Logos. This, one expects, will either tear the scales from his eyes, or cause his head to explode like Michael Ironside in Scanners is after him with a vengeance.

Pr 9:10

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom:

and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.
And 10:13

In the lips of him that hath understanding wisdom is found….
And so on and so on, to an extent that these appear overall to be inextricably linked, like twins, but remaining in some sense separate and not causative, either of the other, per se. That is, they are a package and neither is primary to the other, just like the so-called Trinity is described.

These passages are so loaded with the feminine aspects of Godhead, associated with traits that are quite specific to later proclamations concerning God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that this short treatment by no means exhausts all the ramifications that develop. I think it’s quite enough for this bit of palaver, though, don’t you? And i haven’t even mentioned Asherah, yet.

We see here that:

There are Goddesses afoot.

At least one of them is Jesus’s sister, or possibly Jesus h(er)imself, as though (s)he were a hermaphrodite or something.

That Christianity, from its mainstream to its headwaters, (excepting rare Gnostic sects), and not just individual bungholes within Christendom, is fundamentally, doctrinally, institutionally wrong, wrong, freaking wrongity, wrong, wrong, wrong,all the zippity-do-dah-day long.

That almost very nearly all you Christians should repent immediately and start loving everyone, unconditionally, quickly, before the short time we have left runs out.

What all this does is to prove, define, refine, and clarify what I’ve been saying rather less succinctly for some time: That the Bible does not say what Christians say it says, at least not alone; that it is most assuredly not what y’all say it is; and that large swaths of your schtick is fracking evil. I have been nagged by doubts all the while–concerns about my own salvation, really. What if i favor these arguments and perspectives simply because i don’t like to follow the law? What if i’m serving my own flesh? Sometimes these concerns have tendrils of root meandering into truth, as well. But no! This revelation from God(dess)(es) clinches it all. I am not crazy; you are!

I am reborn yet again! Set free by Truth! A child of God for real, which God is no bolt-wielding funknode, but more a Father than i am to ;my own children, and a damn fine Mother, to boot. And more still; brother to my sister the Goddess whom i have always sought, though i knew it not. Abba, Father! Aima, Mother!

I don’t know what to make of this turn of events, exactly. I’m pretty sure, (but not sure at all), that the tide of Christendom will not shift at the word of a stoned house-painter, a repeated failure at business and marriage and the mechanics of living in general; in many eyes a flippiting criminal; but there it is. Come at me. My Siblings the Gods and Goddesses of the Ages, of all Creation and of Whatever There Is Above and Beyond, have my back all day, all night. Argue. Fight. Imprison. Kill. Fick it! You can’t win this; it’s not me.
On the other hand, you could abandon your miserable fight. Come on! Jump in! The Living Water is great!

Rate this:

Wanna Pass this around?

Like this:

So we’ve all been very busy and i haven’t had much time for producing new stuff, lately. Hopefully that will change soon, but maybe not so much for a month or so. This is a short bit from just prior to the establishment of the Occupy encampment in Colorado Springs at which i was arrested for camping. The rest of that story is diffused throughout the stuff i’ve written over the past three years, and in various court docs. This is really just more context, and some history. Funny to note my anticipation of a big deal on Wall Street, which came before the Colorado Springs camp, or even the Boston or Oakland camps, for instance.

This is just a short one, but i’ll try and get another up before we’re out of town for a few weeks of community-building in far-flung states.

Holmes Sweet Holmes

20 September 2011

For NMania1: Thanks for the Voice

And for Bob Holmes: I love you Bob, I swear. But you deserve this.

Don’t feel too sad–I deserve much worse.

Way back in May of this year, I promised this to a guy who “sold” me a free newspaper in Denver for a $1 suggested donation. He said he was a writer for the same paper, which addresses issues surrounding homelessness in the same city. He was interested in the state of those affairs in Colorado Springs, where I live, and, given that I’ve been in the free food biz for 26 years, and that I have, in fact been homeless myself, I had to think I was in a unique position to afford some perspective. I also posted an, (untitled ), bit on the same topic clear back on 12 April of 2010, wherein I promised a follow-up. Things have worked around to a moment where changes have taken place in both the homeless community of our town and in my schedule that render ripe the moment. A year and a half ago, I described a little of the circus-like scene in our town surrounding the homeless campers. Here’ a bit more flesh, spiced with perhaps a bit more vinegar. Don’t get all touchy, now.

Colorado Springs has always been pretty friendly to street-runners, at least since 1984 when I got here. I got to know my way around when I hit town as a 20 year old apprentice electrician and found work for the–ahem–generous wage of $6.00 an hour. Within a year, I had fallen in with some folks at Calvary Chapel downtown in the same building occupied by our town’s token “liberal” free paper now. We gave away sandwiches and such, among some other more ideologically driven activities. I’ve been in on this little pastime of mine in one capacity or another ever since, from various angles, and with variable motivation. (Spiritual vagaries aside, nothing is ever about just one thing). What I mean to point out is that I have been around long enough to have a little feel for the pulse of the thing, nothing more.

I’m no prophet. God has yet to send me any memos. All I did earlier was interpret the writing on the wall that was there for anyone to see, in big scrawling, blocky letters. I think anyone looking could read them clearly enough, including Bob Holmes, if he hadn’t been in his customary, red-faced, squinty-eyed, self-imposed insensate condition. That doesn’t count for an honest mistake, Bob!

Now, here’s a little secret–sshhh! The camps are back. I can’t speak for the general level of brain power amongst drunken, whacked out homeless guys, but even the blankest screen among my favorite crowd has developed an ingrained self-preservatory wiliness. So you won’t see them sprawled along the highway like a middle class Somali neighborhood, like before. And I’m not gonna tell you where they are. The cops simply must know already, and my friends don’t need another three-ring fiasco. But, truckloads of enabling aside–I freakin’ told you, Bob!

I have an absolutely gigantic boatload of my own, patented bool-shyte to sling about all this, (imagine that), but here’s a little teaser before I have to go actually do something this morning. At this moment of extreme sensitivity to initial conditions, (watch Wall street, now, y’all), we really ought to notice the shit we’ve been up to all these, say 10,000 years, isn’t working. Let’s switch to a genuinely loving thing.

Like this:

Had some words with my friend Bruce yesterday–OK, lots of words. In fact, the Spirit moved me, so I was blasting words all over the place like that guy from the X Men, only with a gag instead of a visor. All the way toward the end of much conversatin’–and yes, Bruce held his end respectably in the face of my torrent–we came to a summation.

The idea is already on the pages here so it’s important and needing some flesh, but it’s also very simple. We all know we can’t prove a negative. Any third grade philosopher know this as an unshakable verity, right? So who will step up to prove that? No one, that’s who–we can’t do it, and mind you, I don’t hearsee that term coming from myself often. I’ll beat my kids senseless if I hear them using it. (Hi kids! Molto amore!). Hell the notion is generational. My totally outstanding 95 year old Granddad banned the word from his brood’s vocabulary, and he started his family during the Great Depression. But we can’t, and we know we can’t.

We can’t even prove that we can’t prove that we can’t prove a negative. We can add layers to our investigation to Eternity, and never can we prove a negative. And yet we know that we know that we know (&c.) that we can’t do it. What the Heellll!!? This is why: Reason breaks down at a point between proving and knowing right here for us to examine like a fascinating diamond, cut in some diabolically ingenious fashion to as to hide its facets from us like a tesseract or something. There’s math that explains this pretty succinctly. Look up Kurt Gödel‘s Incompleteness Theorem, (here’s a good start http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/goedel/). Gödel, [whose name I’ll be disrespecting til I figure out how to add an umlaut on this thing, (HA!)], wrote a bunch of High Math, way beyond my capacity, that shows us when reduced to terms even I can grok, that any closed system can never possibly contain all the tools necessary to fully describe itself. With me so far?

This shows us another Eternal Verity: Truth transcends Proof; and further–our ability to know does the same. Now, Bruce is a philosopher, and kind of a Christian, so this sort of shit doesn’t bother him like it may the Scientific Determinists that read this. What we are gazing upon, through the lens of our little diamond, is an example of our ability to “jump out of the system”, and view it from outside, in some manner as indescribable as how we can know there’s no proving a negative. (Apologies to Doug Hofstadter for abusing an idea I came across in Gödel, Escher, Bach. I’m about to depart from his comfort zone, I think. He did, give him mucho credit, respectably describe the idea within the closed system of those pages). This is an ability we share with God. This, I think, is at least in part why some tidbit of western scripture says, “Ye are gods,” (Psalm 82, for you skeptics; read it all and get some context before attempting to argue, please).

This whole line of thought is closely associated with the Ontological Argument as proof of God, if not fully dependent upon it, (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ontological-arguments/). For the uninitiated, this is a supremely brilliant bit of philosophical tomfoolery that attempts to prove the existence of God by reason alone, in an orderly procession of thought utterly divorced from empirical evidence. If anyone would care to take it on, I’d love–no LOVE–to see a genuine debunking. It’s very slippery indeed, and feels for all the world like a stage magician pulling infinite decks of cards from his sleeves. But it’s irrefutable, in my stupid little mind. It jumps the system.

I’ll readdress the crap we’ve mulled over here, but this is good. Put simply–arithmetically, one might say–1) We can’t prove a negative; 2) We know this; 3) Truth is superior to proof; 4) We are therefore superior to the closed system of All-There-Is;5) Only god is thus; 6) We are gods. (Yes, I took a leap there at step 6. I only have so much attention span. Roll wit’ it for now, OK? It’s in the Ontological Argument if you feel like getting ahead of me). This is arithmetical, yes, and handily sums up my points from yesterday, Bruce and friends. But, as you’ve seen by now I guess, that doesn’t mean one can’t do a bit of Algebra, Trig, or (Meta)Physics with it.

***

Jeez, I hope you all enjoyed that. Please don’t burn me at the stake yet. There’s more. It’ll take a while to work around the mess of toroidal thinking here. See Bruce–I didn’t forget that part. I’m only human, even if we are all gods. Bear in mind all, that Nothing here is any more valuable than the opinion of one idiot house painter. And any of you who have read the stuff before this will know already: It’s all a bunch of bullshit.

I began publicizing this contest when I got word that the magazines had been shipped from Canada to the distributors in the USA around July 18th. Readers Rushed to the racks only to find them strangely void of skunk magazine. Again and again from different parts of the country it was the same story… either the store carried the magazine but only had the best of volume 9 or the store didn’t seem to know what magazine the customer was speaking about. Here is an example and some answers from Pebbles Trippet of Skunk Magazine

I have not had any entries yet from any location to win the 16×20 poster (first prize) or the 8×10 (second prize) in my contest WIN a 16x 20 Poster or 8×10 print of the Skunk Mag Maya Angelou image. My portrait of Maya Angelou appears in an article by Pebbles Trippet in SKUNK Magazine volume 10 issue 1 (page 24)

People seem to be having trouble finding the magazine… so everyone has an equal chance of winning the prints.

Finally got to lay eyes on the magazine with my art in it! Thanks to Toni Fox and Pebbles Trippet for making sure that I got a couple of copies in my hands. Thanks for the honor of letting my art honor Maya Angelou

I have not had any entries yet from any location to win the 16×20 poster (first prize) or the 8×10 (second prize) in my contest WIN a 16x 20 Poster or 8×10 print of the Skunk Mag Maya Angelou image. My portrait of Maya Angelou appears in an article by Pebbles Trippet in SKUNK Magazine volume 10 issue 1 (page 24)

People seem to be having trouble finding the magazine… so everyone has an equal chance of winning the prints.

Breezy KiefairThat’s what I’m hearing again and again. Its real sad these retail outlets make deals with magazine companies and do not make the magazines themselves available to customers. I guess we as customers just need to keep bugging them…. maybe we need to start writing barnes and noble and 7/11’s customer service emails???

Nina Cooper EmersonThe guy I asked said..”They just bring them when they bring them.” I wonder who distributes for 7-11….hmmm.

Pebbles TrippetThat is a good question. And there’s a distinction between franchise and non-franchise. Please find out what you can so we can make Skunk more available in this country..

Pebbles TrippetWe have permission from Skunk editor, John Vergados, to make the entire Maya Angelou Tribute, artwork and cover available for reading the text. Open the floodgates, Breezy.

Nina Cooper EmersonThe weekly magazines are up front….the guy said that every 7-11 gets them on different days…like one will get on a Tues….another on Wed…etc. But for the monthly/quarterly magazines, it isn’t as clear as to when they come. He didn’t know much more than that… I’ll try to get to Barnes and Noble this weekend.

Part of the problem is inherent in distribution of a Canadian marijuana magazine in the US where you don’t know the community terrain–such as head shops & hemp stores with literature sections, used bookstores and local liquor stores. So Skunk Mag found an avenue thru Barnes&Noble Books, a national chain, and certain 7/11 markets and local liquor stores that already carry High Times, tatoo & porn mags. Marijuana prohibition plays a part in this lack of access, which is exactly what it’s supposed to do. What about dispensaries? Some are turned off by anything that is not essentially medical in nature (O’Shaughnessy’s is ok because it is based in high-powered cannabinoid science but Skunk is not, because it is broadly speaking cultural in nature with too much skin on display.) Some of the more broadminded dispensaries concerned about their customers’ broader education eagerly stock Skunk Mag, back issues and all. But someone has to be on the lookout & ask someone in charge at these dispensaries if they will carry a high-powered monthly magazine to sell to their patients. It’s about educating those who appreciate intelligent irreverent views, how-to all-organic grow tips from the rev and in depth interviews of go-to women in the international cannabis community. Carry an issue or two with you when you visit these dispensaries and let me know which ones would like to give it a try. Here’s an example – A Mendocino County dispensary takes up an entire row of glass space with a spectrum of back Skunks, each one available for sale. Sugaree came up in conversation and they instantly went to the Oct 2013 back issue for the winner pictured there.

Breezy KiefairI understand pebbles… what I don’t understand is why it took so long to hit outlets like 7/11 (still need to do my due diligence on the local barnes and noble) in a state where its logical more copies could and would be sold. It seems like a poor decision on the part of 7/11 / barnes and nobles. I could see not shipping to areas that they just WON’T sell but in weed states…. its different.

Pebbles TrippetI agree, certainly in CO. It shows how literature, as opposed to product, has taken a back seat in our consciousness across the board in the prohibition scheme. Knowledge has largely been passed underground and publications are hailed if they survive a…See More

Breezy Kiefairperhaps this is a good topic to bring to the skunk higher ups. they need to at least be aware of the issue and working the problem…. what the solution is yet, even i dont see clearly right now, but wheels in my head are turning and the more heads working the problem the better.

Breezy Kiefairi will follow up with a local barnes and noble, more 7/11s, tattered cover… i already talked you up in mile high pipe and tobacco… i usually only buy meds once a month but am looking for a new dispensary close to the new house so will talk skunk up along the way

Pebbles TrippetI told management how unavailable it is in the bustling Bay Area; they were surprised to hear it. That suggests they rely on local distributors. The question is who covers Denver and environs? The plight of print media has forced B&N out of the cities into the suburbs where it is easy to marginalize an already marginalized subject. In both the El Cerrito and Emeryville B&Ns, they had run out early in the month. I left my number, asked the supe to raise the monthly order and to start paying attention to something worthwhile. (ha) Perhaps we need to compile a local list of dispensaries and small businesses interested in adding Skunk Mag to their monthly inventory; then find local existing distributors who want to enhance their repertoire. “If they’re irresponsible we can do better”, we might say. But we do need to know who already exists. Who distributes to Tattered Cover Books? Probably not the same person as distributes to 7/11… Whoever that distributor is may want to step up & carry bulk orders of Skunk at our suggestion, especially if it’s a list we create and vouch for. People don’t know who to trust so they abstain. Here, we’re fulfilling the wish of the voters who approved the importance of access to cannabis which includes credible reliable information. 3D could top that list ordering a year’s worth of monthly Skunk bundles. Her previous free bundle was one time only in appreciation for the interview. The current v10#1 bundle was sent gratis to you, Breezy, %3D one time only for your Angelou artwork, poetry and synthesis. Now we start a new stage, stepping up cannabis consciousness with an improved distribution network of trustworthy outlets where Skunk Mag will be available with cannabis literature unread elsewhere — from Tokin’ Female activists, writers & artists, scientists in organic growing, lawyers who care, editors and publishers who make it happen. And of course the cannakids, who are raising our community in the ways of compassion.

Pebbles TrippetGood work Breezy… they stand out even at the bottom. Tell the manager to get 10 more, they usually have a number they can call on the spot and leave a message for an additional order. What about Denver? Is Tattered Book Covers in Denver? Headshops? Dispensaries?

Breezy Kiefairi’m going to do that foot work later this week. dispensaries tend to expect reviews when i go in… i’ve been trying to reduce my workload but will be on the lookout for a new “home” dispensary anyway giving me the chance to chat up skunk along the way.

MORE ON ACCESS ISSUES STRAIGHT FROM PEBBLES TRIPPET

On the distribution issue, our grassroots insistence that all these various outlets carry marijuana publications that speak for the broader community is critical — headshops, dispensaries, used bookstores, community centers, liquor stores, barnes & noble — all these places we frequent should be asked to carry Skunk Mag, because it represents the interests of a budding marijuana community that can no longer be denied. Everyone in their area needs to reach out on this one, let me know which outlets we can add. If there’s no distribution person in the area, the bundles go out from Montreal direct to the outlet.

Skunk Magazine’s purpose is to represent the interests of the broader marijuana community: intellectuals, artists, writers, home cultivators, patients, feminists, cannafamilies, ill children — the cannabis family worldwide. This month’s issue of Tokin’ Female is a tribute to the phenomenal life of Maya Angelou, featuring Breezy Kiefair’s synthesis of art and poetry and Tokin Woman’s My, Oh Maya on Angelou’s marijuana roots. Skunk Mag has provided space and respect.

Wanna Pass this around?

Like this:

Friday, August 1, 2014

Also Done With Mirrors

Also Done With Mirrors

From The El Paso County Jail

June 2014

In jail now for contempt of court, i can only hope that i will not be punished for thought, given my intent with this piece more or less to publicly scorn the same court and many of its agents represented here at the misnamed Criminal Justice Center of El Paso County. I will concentrate on this local example for specifics because of intimacy, but recent news and broad history supports my encouragement to the reader that (s)he extrapolate freely.

I’d almost rather sleep than pace around here like a tyger in a fucking zoo, but i am as i have been formed. I really don’t think you fuckers can make me sleep without some kind of assault. It’s possible a dispassionate observer might develop the notion that you can piss me off, so to speak, that you can make me blow my Zen, but no–that was i, and i’m over it already.

Here at the El Paso County Jail, called the “Criminal Justice Center,” uniforms abound and each, of course, conveys a message. All the prisoners are color coded. The deps and “specialists’ and nurses and “contractors” are all of a feather, some with fancier tails as it were, expressive of assorted specifics. Variation is for the most part strictly verboten, (sorry to misuse the language for such a purpose, T. You know what i mean.)

Prisoners are separated by severity of “crime,” degree of danger to self or others, and some by a certain degree of “privilege” (these are called “trusty”). Deputies are generally demarcated according to “authority.” Some have little shoulder insignia indicating rank, “honors,” or extreme pathology. “Civilians” in various “house nig…um…servant,” (ahem), positions bear yet further uniform garb, while certain haughty nabobs glide around in suits carrying clipboards, heads high, presumably to be the more able to reach the rarefied air that must sustain them with their pinched aquiline nostrils.

With irony that may or may not be intentional on someone or something’s part, the same uniforms described as so expressive also squelch some communication, which would be quite freely broadcast in ordinary circles. Certainly “club” colors are vigorously banned. Stuff like those placeholders for my ears. Some shit slips by: Many Department of Corrections guys, (prisoners), are recognizable by “penitentiary” labels on personal clothing. Haircuts, though highly imperfect at clarity, often show fondness for a martial life. The richest bearers of information of all apart from coded wristbands we wear under a pretty fair degree of duress are tattoos, freely and openly displayed by all but the besuited clipboard crowd.

The deputies have prevented me from wearing the little protective posts made of comb teeth i put in my ears, meant to keep the piercings from closing, as an experiment in boundaries, and as an expression of my identity; a bit of communication through appearance; silent aesthetic vocalization. One pleasant deputy said to me with great concern and chagrin in both his voice and his eyes, “Oh, no! This is terrible!” I asked him about his concern and he played it off as a joke; “Sarcasm.” But to me, “this”–that is, a bit of aesthetic experimentation that serves to announce my separation from a society i find abhorrent–is a marvelous thing, rich in multifaceted, radiating, information-bearing emanations. We all do these things, and some of us then wonder why we are rejected by those for whom we define ourselves as Other by those choices of appearance we make of our own volition.

No one can do anything about skin color, for example, and we ought not make assessments about human beings that are based on unchangeables like that, but we do anyhow. And life probably works out to support those assessments. Whether the differences are real or not, when two segments of society conspire to call one another’s members hateful names, like “nigger,” or “cracker,” or “Palestinian,” or “Jew,” the intonation of Otherness establishes a state of polarity where the prophecies inherent in the expression all become true, eventually. That’s pretty crazy in itself. At The El Paso County Jail the most desperate of prisoners–the mixed-color-teal-and-yellow crowd–are garbed thusly so that they are easily recognizable as homicidal-suicidal. They seem to live a miserable existence, isolated from everyone because of mutual fear, from which font their own dreaded behavior springs. The nurses in the medical unit where many of these saddest of souls reside sometimes and apart from regulation wear colors so similar that i have been startled by the spectacle of those shades in unexpected places. But i have had conversations with EPCO jail employees that went something like, “You should find something to do that doesn’t eat your soul.” “Oh, I’m fine–I get home and just forgetaboutit. Turn it off,” with a motion like flipping a switch. “Do you really think partitioning your personality–your life–your Self–to that degree so you won’t flip out is healthy!!? Isn’t that exactly how ‘multiples’ work things?” So just who are the crazy ones?

One deputy said to me, “Sixty to seventy percent of the cops in this town are just doing their jobs.” This is so multi-dimensionally wrong: Only a mental pathology allows a guy to perpetrate violence against an unwilling subject for a mundane paycheck that is derived in part from money confiscated from that very person being so victimized. This is deeply parasitic and also pretty fucking stupid in that biologically, the most successful parasite is one that works a symbiotic relationship with its host. The relationship of our government, (and virtually all governments), to its host our society is now and will soon prove to be catastrophically vitacidal. Meanwhile, what are the other forty percent doing? My estimation figures the best part of this minority is enjoying the sanction of the same gullible society to be violent for pay and false “honor.” Some of these two groups are actually deluded to imagine they are helping people.

“Can’t break the rules just doin’ my job nothin’ personal behind that blow to the head gotta paycheck to collect gotta family to feed….”

Assuredly history’s most spectacularly egregious crimes, and lest any reader seeks to comfort himself with false abstraction, those of this very day, this very moment, have always been committed beneath the false flag of “The Rules.”

I’ve heard it said in the context of “appearances” that the men and women of “Gateway” “represent El Paso County,” so that they are not permitted to wear a Mohawk, (or i suppose, bits of comb in their ears). Now, be alert that i am not a Gateway man, exactly, but i am here because of appearances, at least in part. To be clear, i don’t represent El Paso County, by any means and i give but the merest of fucks for appearances. I represent some higher Thing, and not by my choice at all; but having been chosen for this i serve my purpose while Judge Williams serves his. We are what we are, and what each of us represents is so far beyond El Paso County that i can’t see its apex from here and i suspect that Judge Williams has scarcely even apprehended its Its truth, having heard of these things only in forgotten dreams. I hope you aren’t hurt, dear Judge; these lots of ours are assigned, not chosen.

I certainly never meant to cause you harm, or even pain, though i can’t deny i have been quite angry; far more at your system than at you, personally. It’s up to you how much grief will be in this for you, but: Fear not, sir; for as i have said, this is all perfectly safe, And again: We are in this together. All of us. Like it or not.

*Submitted with respect to those EPCO Schindlers who struggle daily to avoid division by zero. And i’ll have to talk more about Gateway, later.

I threatened someone that asked that i might post up some old backstory of mine here on Kiefair.com. Breezy encourages me, so this is that. I’ll post more, along with new. Thanks!

15 September, 2011

Willie and Waylon and Some Other Guy: A story about weed, marriage, and Texas tall tales.

Part I

I like telling the story of the time we went to Telluride with my brother David to catch the Bluegrass Festival there. Dave is a pretty dang famous fiddler, and this happened 13 or 14 years ago when his Freight Hoppers were riding a crest, having two then current Billboard Top 10 Americana list releases on Rounder, (Rounder is pretty much a ripoff for them, but that’s for another time). The Freight Hoppers were hot in Colorado, and their set would draw some 30, 000 festival-goers, with a respectable bevy of hairy Deadheads looking for an outlet following Jerry’s departure bouncing , flouncing and working their little Tai Chi dance up at the stage. Lots of really notable musicians liked The Hoppers, too, and still do, actually.

Anyhow, we would meet up with Dave and the band at the festivals after winding through a long cattle-line setup, to get to the will-call desk and pick up our magic-rainbow all-access wristbands and hang out all weekend with all these niche-famous musicians, eating, drinking, being merry, smoking, and playing music together. That shit is great!

So one day we’re back stage chillin’ with Tony Furtado, (hi Tony—rock on!), and someone goes, “Is that Johnny Cash?” and sure enough, The Highwaymen had showed up to play an unscheduled set. We never made it away from whatever we were doing at the time to see them play, but not long later, as if they had come for no other purpose, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson show up looking for my brother to tell him how much they dig his music. How cool is that!? Well, we all got to jawin’, and knowing a little about Willie I pulled a little fairly decent weed out of my pocket and offered it, but Willie said, “Oh, no thanks, son, put that away,” and busted out some G13 mutant weed or something, and sparked the stoniest joint I’ve ever smoked in my life, to this very day. What a day!

Now, Willie has always been a hero of mine. His heroes have always been cowboys, he says; mine have always been outlaws, and I always figured Willie for a true outlaw, to the core. I mean the guy runs for president on a platform built of pot smoke, with Ani DiFranco as his running mate. Go Willie! That’s why some things he’s said lately trouble me. I’ll get to that in a minute but the first order of business here is to retell that story one more time, (not that I won’t tell it again—it’s a great staple of mine at parties and such), and to let you in on a secret: It’s all bullshit! It never happened!

***

I am a teller of tall tales, a spinner of yarns, a slinger of bool-shyte. That’s what I do. I’m gonna do some now, here; it’s my schtick, and folks who know me will instantly recognize some of the regular phraseology of my everyday standup, right here on the page. Hi Tim! Hi kids! Hi Willie! Some will recognize little inside tidbits and feel special. They’ll pick out my little eddies and anticipate how I circle back around myself. Hell, if you’re reading you might just as well go ahead and start feeling all conspiratorial and special right now. I mean, this is certainly not USA Today. You can pretty much count on being in an exclusive number by this count.

So if this is a bit of improv by a bullshit artist, how do you know this isn’t all bullshit right now? I’ll let you in on another secret: it is! That’s right—it’s the Lying Cretin. Everything I say is a lie. The Lie is truer than the Truth. Willie and I will be burning one in Austin when I make it down that way in a few months and we’ll laaaugh and laugh about this whole thing, because he gets it, you know:

This statement does not belong in the set of all true statements.

Wrap your head around that a spell. It can’t be done. And no side-winding tap-dance involving imaginary words like”pseudo-statement” allowed, either. This is True Lies. It’s a breakdown in reason, a blind spot in our panoramic window to Reality like that thing with the dots you learned in elementary school. You can not manipulate the notions here to fit your mind, though you may, just maybe, be able to manipulate your mind to fit the notions. OK, so I’ll admit we can’t prove the magick here, and maybe someday some mathematician will build a technical ladder up and out of Gödel’s pit, but, we can’t prove a negative, right? But let’s see ya prove that. And now follow it back to the beginning of this paragraph, the beginning of this rant, the beginning of everything you’ve ever read, heard, saw, sensed felt.

And, lo and behold, you find yourself “poised on the wave of explicit Presence, the clockless Nowever.”

Pogo couldn’t have known the heft and resonance of his words: “We have met the enemy, and he is us.”

I wrote a screed a while back, (Today’s Tom Sawyer), excoriating shitty Christian behavior. There’s still plenty to say about all that, and maybe some of it will come out here, but it’s not the point of this one. During that earlier rant, i promised to harp, eventually, about bad behavior on the part of pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, and some of my other natural affinity groups as well.

That isn’t it either. Or maybe it is. But not really. Not quite. I promised to write about the Fear, too, and nor is it that, though the Fear runs through it all. This is about a war.

Many members of of various of the groups on that funny little list i jotted just now recognize and will now openly state that there’s a war looming. They’re wrong about that much anyhow–the looming is all done and the fight is on. Right now. It’s been on for decades, (or maybe forever). I’m here “jotting” because that’s what one does in the county jail, where i am a political prisoner–a POW, really, though i prefer to think of myself as a prisoner of conscience–but maybe it’s a digression to say so. Or maybe not. Let’s explore this amalgam of notions a bit, and see if we can find out.

Here at the county jail one finds a peculiarly refined microcosm of the way the dynamics of the variously conflicting groups involved in this bizarre war interact, cleared of much of the dross of false civility that ordinarily circumvents the fight out on the sidewalk, at least here in the U.S.A.

I know Europeans here that want to skedaddle from this place and others afraid to come here because many of them can see the shitstorm brewing and it scares them. They often seem to see it more clearly than we Americans are able to do at least in part because our access to real news is barely over nil, of maybe because as outside observers they aren’t saddled with the cognitive dissonance we sorry brainwashed frogs that live in this hot-ass boiling lake must so often suffer. I don’t know. I hope they realize this pond holds us all.

Oddly enough, while the interactions at the county jail display some of the finer points of conflict in out absurdly labeled free society, they also show some reasons for hope. There are still lights burning.

“Fuck the Police!”

I don’t know how many times i’ve heard that phrase from some of my dearest friends. I’ve uttered them myself. Often. Sometimes at the top of my lungs. Sometimes it was far more personal: “Fuck you! That’s right, you, personally, whomever you may be in your opposition to me, my pursuits, my people. Maybe i should refer to the less common; “Fuck the Pigs,’ because the police are only a fractional representation of one segment, one camp of that particular overarching social entity the hippies were talking about when they began to disparage swine so badly as to label their opposition thusly in this odd existential war from whence the flesh and blood scrap derives.

“Battle lines are being drawn,” went the line from the Buffalo Springfield some fifty-ish years back. They’re pretty well drawn, now, though they resemble lines a three-year-old might scribble. The shit’s on. People are fighting. The skirmishes often feel like some kind of kids’ game though too, involving blindfolds and billyclubs. Maybe i can’t deny swinging a stick around myself, sometimes. Maybe that’swhat this is–a chance for me to look in the mirror a little, Maybe it’s because it’s hard to sit the game out when i keep getting hit in the head. Whatever. Let’s keep on through the maze and just hope we don’t smash too many mirrors.

During the Occupation we intrepids staged a few years back, (and some of us still engage–viva la revolución and all), my son and i traveled to Denver for the final push when the cops razed the encampment there. The scene that October of 2011 there in Denver was some shit this country hadn’t seen in over forty years maybe, where armored brigades of soldiers–not cops at all but stormtroopers–rolled on a huge, disparate group of unarmed citizens. It was tragic. And beautiful. Versions of the same scene played out all around the world that fall.

There at Civic Center Park, across the avenue from the State Capitol building, the Boy and i stood in the thick of it as those battle lines sharpened, and then blew apart as the whole outhouse hit the fan.

Some thousands of us had marched boisterously through Denver’s business district, pausing for a special visit at the Federal Reserve. After completing a wide loop around downtown we mounted the Capitol steps for whatever confrontation the Denver planners had planned. They, (to claim a thing–we), had been warned explicitly beforehand to stay off that particular edifice, so the moment we took the steps and began railing through one of our ubiquitous bullhorns, the shock teams appeared, as if the bearded-Spock Enterprise had beamed them to the scene.

Honestly, i was pretty fucking nervous at that point. It’s not as though i’d never been beaten up by the cops before, but that stuff is kind of a young man’s sport, and i was never really all that much a fan anyhow. Besides, those had always been cops, not armored sci-fi gladiators. But the main thing was the Boy. He was fifteen then and down for plenty, but he looked pretty worried too, and, (the mainthing, actually), i knew i’d never live through my next conversation with his mother if i allowed him to be beaten and busted by the police. I suggested we pull back to the park and we did, but i felt pretty spineless for having done it, really.

The Boy and i had a quick consult: “You see what this is going to be, right?” “Yeah.” “Are you down, or not?” Nervous but firm, “Yeah.” “Fuck it then…God damn it; your mom is gonna kill me. Let’s get some lunch.”

The park itself was packed with crowds of Occupiers, some having returned with us from the march and probably harboring thoughts similar to mine. The encampment had been there for a good while by then, and the Black Flag Anarchists’ Free Kitchen was in full flight. It had already been dismantled more than once as a special preparatory project for the cops–kind of a warm-up. Knowing well what was coming, the no-nonsense scrappy men’n’women in black behind the table were all assholes with elbows, flying around in a frenzy with grim serious joy in their eyes as they did their level best to sling as much great tasting free food as possible before the inevitable hammer fell. Those guys were freaking awesome sauce with motherfuckin’ cherries on top!

Rather than spark an actual and possibly justifiable war on the Capitol steps, even the most radical and adrenaline-blinded of the group holding that position chose to retreat and quickly joined us at the park. The scene was oddly festive, with tents and art projects and folks dressed for carnival. The mid-autumn day was one of those beautiful Colorado Indian summer affairs with pristine blue skies through which flitted happy and blissfully oblivious birdies merrily on the lookout for delectable kitchen scraps. But wait! What the hey!!? The second the steps were abandoned and that contingent joined those meeker souls at the park, the rest of the cops in the danged known universe materialized in a huff and began setting up for some sort of paramilitary invasion. No shit–we all saw pretty quickly what the Denver PD had in mind for all those fun military vehicles and equipment they’d been collecting.

The scene changed dramatically there on the sidewalk where the Anarchists’ Kitchen was set up. There was plenty of action before then, but the top-gun radicals had been at the Capitol along with most of the cops. Now a phalanx quickly formed four deep with armored, shielded, armed, dangerous, implacable, and apparently stoically unflappable police stretching all around, up and down–all over the fucking place. Where the Boy and i stood a few sidewalk squares south of the Kitchen the scene was still like a carnival spreading away and outward into the park in every direction save the east, buy more like something Ray Bradbury or John Clifford might have dreamt up. Moving east to west one would have passed through four rows of cops in a formation that i’d only seen before in movies about Fascist takeovers where American patriots saved the day by vanquishing some identically clad and positioned foe as we occupiers faced that day, armored only with our damn-the-torpedoes ethical certitude. Stepping by the entrenched police if one were to dare it, one would have passed a modest tree lawn, an ordinary sidewalk crowded with dark festival-goers, and could then step up to the folding table that served as the Anarchists’ ordering counter and serving table set up facing east from the immediate western line of the sidewalk across from the antiMayberry lines facing the stubbornly unaltered scene in the Kitchen.

The cops just stood there for what seems to memory like hours, but it couldn’t have been all afternoon or anything. Maybe so. The Boy and i milled around a bit getting a look at the overall scene and scoping out the various sections of the park. Behind the Kitchen to the west were the bulk of the tents, say a hundred or more, though others were scattered about. Further west a concrete round with maybe a fountain or something hosted a bunch of info tables, some artsy hippies working on various projects, a triage setup, some chanting Hare Krishnas. More cops surrounded the camp, even more moved to close off the farthest reaches of the west side, We all saw we were utterly circumscribed and our physical position was hopeless. There was plenty of Hope, mind you, but all of it founded on our spiritual position, see.

As we awaited what everyone knew to be inexorable, not so many of us remained quiet, (by “us” i mean Occupiers here; the most visible government employees were silent). I did mostly, and so did the Boy, he for his reasons and i for mine. The whole scene produced its own racket, but the most noticeable volume arose from the collection of spirit-moved Occupiers working the lines of eerily insensate gendarmes. Each was moved by his or her own personal spirit, few of which were very friendly toward the collective juggernaut we faced. More than one strode frenetically up and down whichever line was convenient hurling f-bombs and spittle with as much force as he could muster. You know: “Fuck the Police!!!” and,“Fuck Yoooou!!!” from distances as close as the collected officers’ gear would allow. The pointillistic rows of cops, each in his own world, stared into space, eyes forward and directed at some Unknown, refusing eye contact. Only God and each man in his solitude knew what blackness filled his vision, (and possibly anyone operating one of those guv’mint mind-reading gizmos, if you’re into that sort of thinking).

Sensibly, few of the “non-violent” protesters were mad–that is crazy–enough to attempt to get physical. Those that did were promptly stomped, smashed and removed from the game. Otherwise with many pushing the envelope right to its most extreme limit, the arms-down-and-rigid-face forward-inches-from-any-nearest-random-cop’s-shielded-face stance of extreme and barely checked agitation rapidly became familiar. I for one was amazed at the extraordinary and rather creepy restraint the beleaguered police were displaying, though few shield-screened eyes could keep from betraying internal turmoil. Virtually none of the cops would assent to eye contact.

As this scene played itself out, a few Occupiers attempted to convince their fellows to mellow. In the midst of the very front and most electrical line of all this, there in front of the aforementioned Kitchen, one lone Occupier was working the line of gear-laden men, moved by a different spirit indeed. He was preaching it, baby. Pleading. Begging. Beseeching. As near to tears as i am now as this scene spills its way from my fingertips, fluid in his expressive motion to and fro as any practiced Sunday morning crowd-pleaser can i get a amen. “Don’t you see it? You are us! We are you! Please, stop this! We are one–we must stop fighting!” And in some brilliant, divinely inspired voice, “Lay down your shields! Join us! Put down your clubs and have some lunch!”

And then …right there in front of the Boy and me…with the scene in the actual Kitchen production area behind the table unchanged from before the lines formed…one of them did exactly that.

There was actually a fat queue at the Kitchen counter that parted like the Red Sea, astonished, for this newborn brother of ours to step up and claim his serving. He ate his food in silence and retook his spot in that other line which remained unaltered as his fellows stood unmoved, apparently in both senses. The Boy and i collected our portion of genuinely bomb-ass risotto and began to eat with more on our minds than i can possibly describe. Before we were half through our plates the order came and we found ourselves dining amidst a police riot, our rice flavored by tear gas. (I got off the hook before, when the story remained vague. I suppose his mom is going to kill me now, after all).

The rest of the action went down as one would expect, with ample blood, outrage, and pepper-bullet injury and indignity and tears and drama. It was all on the news, with much expansion available on YouTube. You can look it up. None of that is the point.

I heard that one cop was fired perfunctorily that night.

We were there. Right fucking there. It really happened. It was so surreal i almost have to ask the Boy if it actually wasn’t some kind of dream.

Those two guys, though. That cop! When we all do what he did, just maybe then the war will be over. He looked up and noticed he was looking in the fucking mirror.

The thing about all this is that the crowd of Occupiers was a full-on quorum of average joes with representation across several spectra. There were Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, Democrats, hippies, neo-hippies, and chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas, The cops were disguised as an invading foreign force but we all know they were really just a bunch of Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, and Democrats. The only groups lacking representation really were the hippies and the chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas that stayed with the rest of us till late into the night serving free food as a replacement for the Anarchists who had been quite the hell shut down. Oh yeah–there likely weren’t too many Anarchists on the cops’ side of the lines. I’m pretty sure those differences are significant. Maybe the cops would be better if they got some of those groups they were missing. The janglier the better.

Back here at the county jail where i’m still Occupying, there’s lots of conflict, though not nearly so boiling hot. The old standby, “Fuck the Police,” is scrawled or carved around and about and plenty of folks on either side of whatever line each has drawn are fully prepared to swing clubs at one another. Many of the sheriff’s deputies and sad, paycheck-to paycheck “detention specialists” are happy to evoke a very dark spirit indeed in their efforts to control us inmates who represent Other to them. I have been struck by the observation that these obnoxious fucks are the respected representatives of a society that so many of our deluded citizenry expect us of the criminal class to emulate.

Ha! I may be an asshole myself, but no thanks: I have no interest in joining your obnoxious and shitty club.

Meanwhile, virtually all of us prisoners, including myself sometimes, react…”Grumble grumble fuck the police why i oughtta etc. etc. ad nauseum” Various of us slink around and steal or fight among ourselves or in general practice a sort of blindfolded subservience to Self. (Marco! Polo!…Ouch! Motherfucker!!!). We’re fucking obnoxious. We want the cops and the guards and judges and bankers and presidents to act differently but…why would they want to join our obnoxious and shitty club? When they do we wind up with a spectacular clusterfuck like the found at the Denver county jail last month, where a dep was helping a banger sling dope and administer beat-downs. Happens all the time. In every kaleidoscopic variation you can imagine.

Pogo couldn’t have known the heft and resonance of his words: “ We have met the enemy, and he is us.”

I wrote a screed a while back, (Today’s Tom Sawyer), excoriating shitty Christian behavior. There’s still plenty to say about all that, and maybe some of it will come out here, but it’s not the point of this one. During that earlier rant, i promised to harp, eventually, about bad behavior on the part of pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, and some of my other natural affinity groups as well.

That isn’t it either. Or maybe it is. But not really. Not quite. I promised to write about the Fear, too, and nor is it that, though the Fear runs through it all. This is about a war.

Many members of of various of the groups on that funny little list i jotted just now recognize and will now openly state that there’s a war looming. They’re wrong about that much anyhow–the looming is all done and the fight is on. Right now. It’s been on for decades, (or maybe forever). I’m here “jotting” because that’s what one does in the county jail, where i am a political prisoner–a POW, really, though i prefer to think of myself as a prisoner of conscience–but maybe it’s a digression to say so. Or maybe not. Let’s explore this amalgam of notions a bit, and see if we can find out.

Here at the county jail one finds a peculiarly refined microcosm of the way the dynamics of the variously conflicting groups involved in this bizarre war interact, cleared of much of the dross of false civility that ordinarily circumvents the fight out on the sidewalk, at least here in the U.S.A.

I know Europeans here that want to skedaddle from this place and others afraid to come here because many of them can see the shitstorm brewing and it scares them. They often seem to see it more clearly than we Americans are able to do at least in part because our access to real news is barely over nil, of maybe because as outside observers they aren’t saddled with the cognitive dissonance we sorry brainwashed frogs that live in this hot-ass boiling lake must so often suffer. I don’t know. I hope they realize this pond holds us all.

Oddly enough, while the interactions at the county jail display some of the finer points of conflict in out absurdly labeled free society, they also show some reasons for hope. There are still lights burning.

“Fuck the Police!”

I don’t know how many times i’ve heard that phrase from some of my dearest friends. I’ve uttered them myself. Often. Sometimes at the top of my lungs. Sometimes it was far more personal: “Fuck you! That’s right, you, personally, whomever you may be in your opposition to me, my pursuits, my people. Maybe i should refer to the less common; “Fuck the Pigs,’ because the police are only a fractional representation of one segment, one camp of that particular overarching social entity the hippies were talking about when they began to disparage swine so badly as to label their opposition thusly in this odd existential war from whence the flesh and blood scrap derives.

“Battle lines are being drawn,” went the line from the Buffalo Springfield some fifty-ish years back. They’re pretty well drawn, now, though they resemble lines a three-year-old might scribble. The shit’s on. People are fighting. The skirmishes often feel like some kind of kids’ game though too, involving blindfolds and billyclubs. Maybe i can’t deny swinging a stick around myself, sometimes. Maybe that’swhat this is–a chance for me to look in the mirror a little, Maybe it’s because it’s hard to sit the game out when i keep getting hit in the head. Whatever. Let’s keep on through the maze and just hope we don’t smash too many mirrors.

During the Occupation we intrepids staged a few years back, (and some of us still engage–viva la revolución and all), my son and i traveled to Denver for the final push when the cops razed the encampment there. The scene that October of 2011 there in Denver was some shit this country hadn’t seen in over forty years maybe, where armored brigades of soldiers–not cops at all but stormtroopers–rolled on a huge, disparate group of unarmed citizens. It was tragic. And beautiful. Versions of the same scene played out all around the world that fall.

There at Civic Center Park, across the avenue from the State Capitol building, the Boy and i stood in the thick of it as those battle lines sharpened, and then blew apart as the whole outhouse hit the fan.

Some thousands of us had marched boisterously through Denver’s business district, pausing for a special visit at the Federal Reserve. After completing a wide loop around downtown we mounted the Capitol steps for whatever confrontation the Denver planners had planned. They, (to claim a thing–we), had been warned explicitly beforehand to stay off that particular edifice, so the moment we took the steps and began railing through one of our ubiquitous bullhorns, the shock teams appeared, as if the bearded-Spock Enterprise had beamed them to the scene.

Honestly, i was pretty fucking nervous at that point. It’s not as though i’d never been beaten up by the cops before, but that stuff is kind of a young man’s sport, and i was never really all that much a fan anyhow. Besides, those had always been cops, not armored sci-fi gladiators. But the main thing was the Boy. He was fifteen then and down for plenty, but he looked pretty worried too, and, (the mainthing, actually), i knew i’d never live through my next conversation with his mother if i allowed him to be beaten and busted by the police. I suggested we pull back to the park and we did, but i felt pretty spineless for having done it, really.

The Boy and i had a quick consult: “You see what this is going to be, right?” “Yeah.” “Are you down, or not?” Nervous but firm, “Yeah.” “Fuck it then…God damn it; your mom is gonna kill me. Let’s get some lunch.”

The park itself was packed with crowds of Occupiers, some having returned with us from the march and probably harboring thoughts similar to mine. The encampment had been there for a good while by then, and the Black Flag Anarchists’ Free Kitchen was in full flight. It had already been dismantled more than once as a special preparatory project for the cops–kind of a warm-up. Knowing well what was coming, the no-nonsense scrappy men’n’women in black behind the table were all assholes with elbows, flying around in a frenzy with grim serious joy in their eyes as they did their level best to sling as much great tasting free food as possible before the inevitable hammer fell. Those guys were freaking awesome sauce with motherfuckin’ cherries on top!

Rather than spark an actual and possibly justifiable war on the Capitol steps, even the most radical and adrenaline-blinded of the group holding that position chose to retreat and quickly joined us at the park. The scene was oddly festive, with tents and art projects and folks dressed for carnival. The mid-autumn day was one of those beautiful Colorado Indian summer affairs with pristine blue skies through which flitted happy and blissfully oblivious birdies merrily on the lookout for delectable kitchen scraps. But wait! What the hey!!? The second the steps were abandoned and that contingent joined those meeker souls at the park, the rest of the cops in the danged known universe materialized in a huff and began setting up for some sort of paramilitary invasion. No shit–we all saw pretty quickly what the Denver PD had in mind for all those fun military vehicles and equipment they’d been collecting.

The scene changed dramatically there on the sidewalk where the Anarchists’ Kitchen was set up. There was plenty of action before then, but the top-gun radicals had been at the Capitol along with most of the cops. Now a phalanx quickly formed four deep with armored, shielded, armed, dangerous, implacable, and apparently stoically unflappable police stretching all around, up and down–all over the fucking place. Where the Boy and i stood a few sidewalk squares south of the Kitchen the scene was still like a carnival spreading away and outward into the park in every direction save the east, buy more like something Ray Bradbury or John Clifford might have dreamt up. Moving east to west one would have passed through four rows of cops in a formation that i’d only seen before in movies about Fascist takeovers where American patriots saved the day by vanquishing some identically clad and positioned foe as we occupiers faced that day, armored only with our damn-the-torpedoes ethical certitude. Stepping by the entrenched police if one were to dare it, one would have passed a modest tree lawn, an ordinary sidewalk crowded with dark festival-goers, and could then step up to the folding table that served as the Anarchists’ ordering counter and serving table set up facing east from the immediate western line of the sidewalk across from the antiMayberry lines facing the stubbornly unaltered scene in the Kitchen.

The cops just stood there for what seems to memory like hours, but it couldn’t have been all afternoon or anything. Maybe so. The Boy and i milled around a bit getting a look at the overall scene and scoping out the various sections of the park. Behind the Kitchen to the west were the bulk of the tents, say a hundred or more, though others were scattered about. Further west a concrete round with maybe a fountain or something hosted a bunch of info tables, some artsy hippies working on various projects, a triage setup, some chanting Hare Krishnas. More cops surrounded the camp, even more moved to close off the farthest reaches of the west side, We all saw we were utterly circumscribed and our physical position was hopeless. There was plenty of Hope, mind you, but all of it founded on our spiritual position, see.

As we awaited what everyone knew to be inexorable, not so many of us remained quiet, (by “us” i mean Occupiers here; the most visible government employees were silent). I did mostly, and so did the Boy, he for his reasons and i for mine. The whole scene produced its own racket, but the most noticeable volume arose from the collection of spirit-moved Occupiers working the lines of eerily insensate gendarmes. Each was moved by his or her own personal spirit, few of which were very friendly toward the collective juggernaut we faced. More than one strode frenetically up and down whichever line was convenient hurling f-bombs and spittle with as much force as he could muster. You know: “Fuck the Police!!!” and,“Fuck Yoooou!!!” from distances as close as the collected officers’ gear would allow. The pointillistic rows of cops, each in his own world, stared into space, eyes forward and directed at some Unknown, refusing eye contact. Only God and each man in his solitude knew what blackness filled his vision, (and possibly anyone operating one of those guv’mint mind-reading gizmos, if you’re into that sort of thinking).

Sensibly, few of the “non-violent” protesters were mad–that is crazy–enough to attempt to get physical. Those that did were promptly stomped, smashed and removed from the game. Otherwise with many pushing the envelope right to its most extreme limit, the arms-down-and-rigid-face forward-inches-from-any-nearest-random-cop’s-shielded-face stance of extreme and barely checked agitation rapidly became familiar. I for one was amazed at the extraordinary and rather creepy restraint the beleaguered police were displaying, though few shield-screened eyes could keep from betraying internal turmoil. Virtually none of the cops would assent to eye contact.

As this scene played itself out, a few Occupiers attempted to convince their fellows to mellow. In the midst of the very front and most electrical line of all this, there in front of the aforementioned Kitchen, one lone Occupier was working the line of gear-laden men, moved by a different spirit indeed. He was preaching it, baby. Pleading. Begging. Beseeching. As near to tears as i am now as this scene spills its way from my fingertips, fluid in his expressive motion to and fro as any practiced Sunday morning crowd-pleaser can i get a amen. “Don’t you see it? You are us! We are you! Please, stop this! We are one–we must stop fighting!” And in some brilliant, divinely inspired voice, “Lay down your shields! Join us! Put down your clubs and have some lunch!”

And then …right there in front of the Boy and me…with the scene in the actual Kitchen production area behind the table unchanged from before the lines formed…one of them did exactly that.

There was actually a fat queue at the Kitchen counter that parted like the Red Sea, astonished, for this newborn brother of ours to step up and claim his serving. He ate his food in silence and retook his spot in that other line which remained unaltered as his fellows stood unmoved, apparently in both senses. The Boy and i collected our portion of genuinely bomb-ass risotto and began to eat with more on our minds than i can possibly describe. Before we were half through our plates the order came and we found ourselves dining amidst a police riot, our rice flavored by tear gas. (I got off the hook before, when the story remained vague. I suppose his mom is going to kill me now, after all).

The rest of the action went down as one would expect, with ample blood, outrage, and pepper-bullet injury and indignity and tears and drama. It was all on the news, with much expansion available on YouTube. You can look it up. None of that is the point.

I heard that one cop was fired perfunctorily that night.

We were there. Right fucking there. It really happened. It was so surreal i almost have to ask the Boy if it actually wasn’t some kind of dream.

Those two guys, though. That cop! When we all do what he did, just maybe then the war will be over. He looked up and noticed he was looking in the fucking mirror.

The thing about all this is that the crowd of Occupiers was a full-on quorum of average joes with representation across several spectra. There were Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, Democrats, hippies, neo-hippies, and chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas, The cops were disguised as an invading foreign force but we all know they were really just a bunch of Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, and Democrats. The only groups lacking representation really were the hippies and the chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas that stayed with the rest of us till late into the night serving free food as a replacement for the Anarchists who had been quite the hell shut down. Oh yeah–there likely weren’t too many Anarchists on the cops’ side of the lines. I’m pretty sure those differences are significant. Maybe the cops would be better if they got some of those groups they were missing. The janglier the better.

Back here at the county jail where i’m still Occupying, there’s lots of conflict, though not nearly so boiling hot. The old standby, “Fuck the Police,” is scrawled or carved around and about and plenty of folks on either side of whatever line each has drawn are fully prepared to swing clubs at one another. Many of the sheriff’s deputies and sad, paycheck-to paycheck “detention specialists” are happy to evoke a very dark spirit indeed in their efforts to control us inmates who represent Other to them. I have been struck by the observation that these obnoxious fucks are the respected representatives of a society that so many of our deluded citizenry expect us of the criminal class to emulate.

Ha! I may be an asshole myself, but no thanks: I have no interest in joining your obnoxious and shitty club.

Meanwhile, virtually all of us prisoners, including myself sometimes, react…”Grumble grumble fuck the police why i oughtta etc. etc. ad nauseum” Various of us slink around and steal or fight among ourselves or in general practice a sort of blindfolded subservience to Self. (Marco! Polo!…Ouch! Motherfucker!!!). We’re fucking obnoxious. We want the cops and the guards and judges and bankers and presidents to act differently but…why would they want to join our obnoxious and shitty club? When they do we wind up with a spectacular clusterfuck like the found at the Denver county jail last month, where a dep was helping a banger sling dope and administer beat-downs. Happens all the time. In every kaleidoscopic variation you can imagine.

Although those of you that have read or will now read the other stuff here on hipgnosis will easily recognize the common ground that one may imagine stands to be found on the lawns inside the moats of our adjacent castles in a neighborhood full of loons, all built on air, i am deeply indebted to Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason for some of the truly fine and beautiful language i snatched more or less wholesale to help me build the last four paragraphs here. Even though their book,The Rule of Four is a best-seller of a popular genre, i highly recommend it as the best book i’ve read produced during the twenty-first century. I wish i had written it myself, (while noting the title of this piece). Everyone should read this book.

Related Information

Related Articles (2)

Bass, the first person cited under Colorado Springs’ camping ban, remains mired in a legal battle backed by a University of Denver assistant professor working for free.

He represents a small segment of the homeless issue – a man on a personal crusade against the camping ban emboldened by the Occupy Colorado Springs movement. His case is not emblematic of others who have been cited for camping on public property; rather, it is more of an outlier.

While people ticketed for camping typically include the chronically homeless – people whose only home is a tent, and who often rebuff police officers’ offers of secure housing – Bass wants to make a point.

Right now, he is free while appealing the jail time. Bass lives with a fellow veteran of the Occupy movement and blogs occasionally on what he sees as injustices in the world.

“I contend now that this thing has burgeoned well beyond the camping ban itself, and has now become a giant discussion of principle, and just what the hell we’re doing here in the United States of America, and the whole world,” Bass said.

Police issued the ticket in October 2011 when he pitched a tent on a sidewalk in Acacia Park, despite warnings from police that doing so would lead to a citation.

For Bass, the ticket and the Occupy gathering proved an opportune time for a stand against the city’s camping ban – an ordinance passed by the City Council in 2010 that outlawed camping on public land. He said he has volunteered at soup kitchens and for other homeless services for about 30 years, and he lives homeless – usually by couch surfing.

“Just because they don’t have any money, poof, they are made criminals,” Bass said of people affected by the ban.

Eleven tickets have been issued under the ban through June 5, with the majority coming in 2014, according to the Colorado Springs Police Department.

The ban came as camps swelled along Monument and Fountain creeks amid the Great Recession in 2009 and early 2010. So many people lived there that bystanders dropped off donated food and clothing along the creek beds – philanthropy that proved overwhelming to the point of concern, some homeless advocates say. Sanitation issues also arose.

City Council member Jan Martin said she voted for the ordinance for the safety of people using creekside trails, along with concerns about the image that such tent cities would create for the city, she said Friday. Proponents of the ban said it is a tool to get people into more stable housing.

“In my opinion, it’s not a matter of out of sight, out of mind,” Martin said. “It’s just trying to find resources that can help people get back on their feet.”

Because of Bass’ indigent status, a judge decided against a fine in favor of a 60-hour community service sentence for the citation.

Bass said he almost did it – he planned on helping Pikes Peak Habitat for Humanity – until a DU professor offered to help. With the pro bono advice of Christopher Lasch, who teaches at the university’s Criminal Defense Clinic, Bass appealed the case.

A district court judge upheld the municipal court’s decision – a blow to the notion that the ban is unjust.

A subsequent appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court was denied in March, said Rob McCallum, spokesman for the Colorado Judicial Branch.

Through it all, Bass contemplated his 60-hour of community service sentence. And in an April hearing before Municipal Judge Spottswood W. H. Williams, Bass said he will never complete the requirement.

Identifying himself as an Occupier, Bass wrote to Williams that the camping ordinance is “effectively status-based incarceration,” because forcing people into shelters could be another form of incarceration. He also said he already does community service but railed against the court forcing him to do so.

“Therefore, i (sic) am here in front of you forcing your hand,” he wrote. “You must now either acknowledge the ethical poverty of the ordinance, or prove my point.”

In June, Williams answered Bass’ statement with a 160-day jail sentence for contempt of court.

Bass is appealing that sentence with Lasch’s help after having served more than a month in El Paso County jail.

Lasch said the jail sentence was excessive because jail time for failing to pay a fine is usually half of what Bass has served.

Even if he serves all 160 days, Bass has no plans of completing the 60-hour community service order – a requirement that remains.

Lasch wants all of it thrown out.

“The fact that the government would go to such lengths to punish this activity certainly supports Steve’s position that this (ban) effectively punishes being homeless,” Lasch said.

“In this case, it certainly punished him for speaking out against the ban.”

More Articles on Toni Fox and 3 D Dispensary coming soon!

I have not done a dispensary review in nearly a year, and I have never reviewed a recreational dispensary before. Now, I could have called ahead and had them prepare me a hand picked review sample, but to me, that’s just not a fair way to review. I’d rather walk in unannounced on a holiday weekend. If there are any problems with herb or with staff, they will be apparent under the higher stresss and potentially higher customer volume of the weekend. The point being, I want to make sure I’m pretty much treated exactly like everyone else. I also like to review when I know the boss is likely away doing other things as this can also be a factor in bud and budtend quality. I must say I was impressed with the professionalism of the staff at 3D Cannabis Center . I’ve been happy with the buds thus far too. be sure to pick up a copy of SKUNK Magazine to read Pebbles Trippet“s awesome interview with Toni Fox